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This  series  of  Scandinavian  Classics  is  published 
by  The  American-Scandinavian  Foundation  in  the 
belief  that  greater  familiarity  with  the  chief  literary 
monuments  of  the  North  will  help  Americans  to  a 
better  understanding  of  Scandinavians,  and  thus  serve 
to  stimulate  their  sympathetic  cooperation  to  good  ends 


SCANDINAVIAN  CLASSICS 
VOLUME  XIII 

NIELS  LYHNE 

BY 
J.  P.  JACOBSEN 


ESTABLISHED  BY 
NIELS     POULSON 


NIELS  LYHNE 

BY 

J.  P.  JACOBSEN 

TRANSLATED   FROM   THE   DANISH 
BY   HANNA  ASTRUP  LARSEN 


1     *    -.     '      ^        ' 


NEW  YORK 

THE  AMERICAN-SCANDINAVIAN   FOUNDATION 

LONDON:    HUMPHREY  MILFORD 

OXFORD  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 

I919 


Qopyright,  iQig,  by  The  <iyimerican-Scandi7iavian  Foundatioti 


'7 


«     e    «    «, 

.  *    «    .  «  - 


T>.  S.  Updil^  .  7"/^^  zMerrymou7it  Tress  -  "Boston  -  U.  S.  ^4. 


Introduction 

TO  the  student  of  Jens  Peter  Jacobsen*s  life  and 
works,  Niels  Lyhne  has  a  value  apart  from  its 
greatness  as  literature  from  the  fact  that  it  is  the 
book  in  which  the  author  recorded  his  own  spiritual' 
struggles  and  embodied  the  faith  on  which  he  came, 
finally,  to  rest  his  soul  in  death  as  in  life.  It  tells  of 
his  early  dreams  an^  ideals,  his  efforts  to  know  and 
to  achieve,  his  revolt  against  the  dream-swathed 
dogmas  in  which  people  take  refuge  from  harsh 
reality,  and  his  brave  acceptance  of  what  he  con- 
ceived to  be  the  truth,  however  dreary  and  bitter. 

The  person  of  the  hero  is  marked  for  a  self- 
portrait  by  the  description,  "Niels  Lyhne  of  Lon- 
borggaard,  who  was  twenty-three  years  old,  walked 
with  a  slight  stoop,  had  beautiful  hands  and  small 
ears,  and  was  a  little  timid," — though  friends  of 
Jacobsen's  youth  declare  that "  a  little  timid"  was  far 
from  describing  the  excessive  shyness  from  which  he 
suffered.  He  himself  would  sometimes  joke  about 
his  "North  Cimbrian  heaviness,"  for  like  Niels 
Lyhne  he  was  a  native  of  Jutland,  where  the  people 
are  more  sluggish  than  the  sprightly  islanders. 
Like  him,  again,  he  had  a  mother  who  kept  alive 
her  romantic  spirit  in  rather  humdrum,  prosaic  sur-J 
roundings,  and  who  instilled  into  her  son's  mindj 
from  childhood  the  idea  that  he  was  to  be  a  poet.  It' 
is  Jacobsen's  own  youthful  ideal  speaking  through 

416768 


vi  INTRODUCTION 

Niels  Lyhne's  mouth  when  he  says:  "Mother — 
I  am  a  poet — really  —  throug-h  my  whole  soul. 
Don't  imagine  it 's  childish  dreams  or  dreams  fed  by 
vanity.  ...  I  shall  be  one  of  those  who  fight  for 
the  greatest,  and  I  promise  you  that  I  shall  not  fail, 
that  I  shall  always  be  faithful  to  you  and  to  my  gift. 
Nothing  but  the  best  shall  be  good  enough.  No 
compromise,  mother!  When  I  weigh  what  I've 
done  and  feel  that  it  isn't  sterling,  or  when  I  hear 
that  it's  got  a  crack  or  a  flaw — into  the  melting-pot 
it  goes !  Every  single  work  must  be  my  best ! " 
J  Niels  Lyhne  never  wrote  the  poems  he  had  fash- 
^  ioned  in  his  mind.  On  the  intellectual  side  of  his 
nature  he  remained  always  a  dreamer,  floundering 
around  in  a  slough  of  doubt  and  self-analysis.  Ed- 
vard  Brandes,in  his  introduction  to  J.  P.  Jacobsen's 
letters,^  calls  attention  to  "the  place  dreams  occupy 
in  this  book,  which  begins  with  the  childish  fan- 
cies of  the  three  boys,  in  which  the  mother  dreams 
with  her  son  of  the  future  and  of  distant  lands, 
while  Edele  dreams  her  love,  and  Bigum  dreams 
his  genius  and  his  passion  —  he  who  is  put  into  the 
novel  as  a  tragic  caricature  of  Niels  Lyhne  himself, 
as  he  goes  about  dreaming,  in  the  midst  of  people 
and  yet  far  away  from  them.  In  his  youth,  Niels 
Lyhne  never  attained  to  anything  but  dreams  of 
great  deeds  and  of  love.  .  .  .  Read  Niels  Lyhne,  ?ind 

*  Breve  Jra  y,  P.  jfacobsen.  Med  et  For  or  d  udgmne  af  Edvard  Brandes, 


INTRODUCTION  vii 

on  almost  every  page  you  will  find  the  word  dream! 
Read  about  Niels  Lyhne's  mother  who  'dreamed 
a  thousand  dreams  of  those  sunlit  regions,  and  was 
consumed  with  longing  for  this  other  and  richer  self, 
forgetting — what  is  so  easily  forgotten  —  that  even 
the  fairest  dreams  and  the  deepest  longings  do  not 
add  an  inch  to  the  stature  of  the  human  soul,'  and 
who  goes  on  dreaming  because  'a  life  soberly  lived, 
without  the  fair  vice  of  dreams,  was  no  life  at  all/  " 
In  his  strictures  on  dreams  and  dreamers  Jacob- 
sen  scourged  his  own  sluggish  temperament,  and 
the  story  of  Niels  Lyhne's  futile  efforts  is  in  part  the 
record  of  the  author's  own  youth.  From  the  time 
he  was  ten  years  old,  he  tells  us,  his  one  sure  dogma 
was  that  he  was  to  be  a  poet,  and  there  must  have 
been  years  of  his  boyhood  and  early  manhood  when 
he  was  haunted  by  visions  of  what  he  wanted  to 
write  without  being  able  to  frame  it  in  a  form  satis- 
factory to  himself  He  was  almost  twenty-five  years 
old  when  his  first  story,  Mogens,  appeared,  in  1 872, 
and  after  that  his  other  short  stories  followed  only 
at  intervals  of  years.  It  is  true,  he  was  by  no  means 
idle.  He  won  distinction  as  a  botanist;  he  intro- 
duced Darwin  to  the  Scandinavian  reading  public 
by  translations  and  magazine  articles,  and  he  famil- 
iarized himself  with  the  literature  not  only  of  Den- 
mark, but  of  England,  France,  Germany,  and  Italy. 
He  had  a  theory  that  any  one  aspiring  to  produce 
creative  literature  ought  to  know  what  had  been 


y 


>' 


viii  INTRODUCTION 

written  by  great  minds  before  him,  and  we  recog- 
nize himself  in  the  picture  of  Niels  Lyhne  restlessly 
trying  to  absorb  all  the  knowledge  and  wisdom  of 
the  ages  while  he  felt  like  a  child  trying  to  dip  out 
:he  ocean  in  his  hollow  hand. 

Unlike  Niels  Lyhne,  who  never  formed  in  his 
own  image  the  clay  he  had  carted  together  for  his 
Adam,  Jacobsen  shaped  his  material  in  the  image 
of  the  vision  that  had  taken  possession  of  him  at 
the  inception  of  his  idea.  Though  execution  always 
cost  him  an  agonizing  effort,  he  did  not  shirk  it, 
and  though  he  worked  four  years  on  each  of  his  two 
novels,  Marie  Gruhhe  and  Niels  Lyhne^  he  never 
lost  sight  of  his  goal.  The  truth  is  that,  however 
much  he  might  abuse  his  own  slothfulness — which 
was  due  largely  to  failing  health  —  Jacobsen  had  a 
slow,  deep  strength  by  virtue  of  which  he  managed 

.  to  write  his  immortal  works. 

/  Niels  Lyhne,  too,  had  a  kind  of  strength  and  was 
essentially  sound  though  a  dreamer.  So  we  see  him, 
when  every  relation  of  life  was  dissolved,  when 
friend  and  mistress  had  thrown  him  back  upon  him- 
self, gathering  himself  together  in  a  resolve  to  find 
a  place  in  his  old  home  and  make  it  a  fixed  point 
in  his  hitherto  aimless  existence.  There,  at  last,  he 
tasted  life  initsfullness,andbyan  effort  of  the  finest, 
purest  will  made  his  short  married  life  an  experience 
of  such  beauty  that  the  description,  so  moving  in 
its  simplicity,  is  one  of  the  most  exquisite  things 


INTRODUCTION  ix 

Jacobsen  ever  wrote.  He,  too,  mastered  life,  though 
not  in  the  sense  of  which  he  had  dreamed.  The 
solution  of  his  hero's  problem  is  perhaps  a  compro-v^ 
mise  on  Jacobsen's  part;  he  did  not  want  to  drop 
his  other  self  as  a  mere  failure,  but  shrank  from  pic- 
turing him  as  the  feted  and  admired  author  he  him- 
self became  in  the  latter  years  of  his  life. 

In  this  connection,  it  may  not  be  out  of  place 
to  state  briefly  that  Niels  Lyhne's  love  aflairs  are. 
drawn  entirely  from  the  imagination.  On  this  point 
we  have  the  positive  evidence  of  Edvard  Brandes 
and  the  negative  testimony  of  Jacobsen's  own  let- 
ters. Even  if  he  had  experienced  the  great  love  for 
which  he  longed  at  the  same  time  as  he  shrank/ 
from  it,  poverty  and  ill  health  would  have  pre- 
vented his  marriage.  His  fine  rectitude  and  horrori 
of  doing  anything  that  might  hurt  another  human! 
being  kept  him  from  questionable  adventures. 

The  revolt  of  his  hero  from  the  accepted  religion^/ 
of  his  day  is  in  accord  with  Jacobsen's  own  develop- 
ment. The  word  "  atheism,"  which  falls  on  our  ears 
with  a  dead  sound,  meant  to  him  a  revolt  against  X 
fallacious  dreams.  He  believed  that  the  evangeli- 
cal religion  as  taught  in  Denmark  at  the  time  had 
become  a  soft  mantle  in  which  people  wrapped 
themselves  against  the  bracing  winds  of  truth.  As 
a  scientist  he  refused  to  accept  the  facile  theory  that 
a  Providence  outside  of  man  would  somehow  juggle 
away  the  consequences  of  wrongdoing.  The  doc- 


/ 


Ji 


X  INTRODUCTION 

trine  that  immunity  could  be  bought  by  repentance 
seemed  to  him  a  cheap  attempt  to  escape  the  bitter 
and  wholesome  fruit  of  experience.  To  our  modern 
consciousness,  there  is  no  reason  why  his  sense  of 
the  sacredness  of  law  should  have  driven  him  away 
from  all  religion  —  it  might  rather  have  driven  him 
to  a  truer  conception  of  Him  who  said  of  Himself 
that  He  came  to  fulfil  the  law  —  but  in  this  respect 
he  was  the  child  of  his  day. 

For  himself,  Jacobsen  resolved  that  illness,  suf- 
fering, and  death  should  not  make  him  accept  in 
weakness  the  religion  that  his  sober  judgment 
in  the  fullness  of  his  strength  had  rejected.  Niels 
Lyhne's  death  "in  armor"  foreshadowed  his  own, 
and  was  perhaps  written  to  steel  himself  for  the 
ordeal  he  knew  to  be  approaching.  His  refusal  to 
lean  on  any  spiritual  power  outside  of  his  own  soul 
lends  an  added  sadness  to  the  stoicism  of  his  death, 
which  took  place  in  his  home  in  Thisted,  in  1885. 

In  the  above  paragraphs  I  have  attempted  only 
to  sketch  the  relation  o^  Niels  Lyhne  to  Jacobsen*s 
own  life.  For  a  brief  estimate  of  his  position  in 
Northern  literature  I  will  refer  the  reader  to  my 
introduction  to  Marie  Gruhbe,  Scandinavian 
Classics,  VII. 

The  translation  of  an  author  who,  as  Edvard 
Brandes  says,"  worshipped  the  word," and  who  be- 
lieved that  there  never  was  more  than  one  word 


INTRODUCTION  xi 

or  one  phrase  in  all  the  world  that  could  exactly 
express  what  he  meant  in  any  given  instance,  is 
naturally  fraught  with  more  than  usual  difficulty. 
I  have  striven,  above  all,  to  be  faithful,  and  very 
often,  where  my  first  impulse  has  been  to  simplify 
a  paragraph,  my  second,  and  I  hope  better,  thought 
has  been  to  leave  it  as  the  master  chose  to  write  it, 
with  only  such  slight  changes  as  the  new  medium 
absolutely  required.  I  wish  to  express  my  sincere 
thanks  to  Professor  W.  H.  Schofield,  chairman  of 
the  Publication  Committee,  who  has  been  so  good 
as  to  read  the  proof  and  has  helped  to  solve  many 
problems  of  language. 

H.A.  L. 


NIELS  LYHNE 


^lELS  LYHNE 

Chapter  I 

SHE  had  the  black,  luminous  eyes  of  the  Blid 
family  with  delicate,  straight  eyebrows;  she 
had  their  boldly  shaped  nose,  their  strong 
chin,  and  full  lips.  The  curious  line  of  mingled  pain 
and  sensuousness  about  the  corners  of  her  mouth 
was  likewise  an  inheritance  from  them,  and  so  were 
the  restless  movements  of  her  head:  but  her  cheek 
was  pale;  her  hair  was  soft  as  silk,  and  was  wound 
smoothly  around  her  head. 

Not  so  the  Blids;  their  coloring  was  of  roses  and 
bronze.  Their  hair  was  rough  and  curly,  heavy  as  a 
mane,  and  their  full,  deep,  resonant  voices  bore  out 
the  tales  told  of  their  forefathers,  whose  noisy  hunt- 
ing-parties, solemn  morning  prayers,  and  thousand 
and  one  amorous  adventures  were  matters  of  family 
tradition. 

Her  voice  was  languid  and  colorless.  I  am  de- 
scribing her  as  she  was  at  seventeen.  A  few  years 
later,  after  she  had  been  married,  her  voice  gained 
fullness,  her  cheek  took  on  a  fresher  tint,  and  her 
eye  lost  some  of  its  lustre,  but  seemed  even  larger 
and  more  intensely  black. 

At  seventeen  she  did  not  at  all  resemble  her 
brothers  and  sisters;  nor  was  there  any  great  inti- 
macy between  herself  and  her  parents.  The  Blid 


,^.    ,  NIELS  LYHNE 

family  were  practical  folk  who  accepted  things  as 
they  were;  they  did  their  work,  slept  their  sleep, 
and  never  thought  of  demanding  any  diversions 
beyond  the  harvest  home  and  three  or  four  Christ- 
mas parties.  They  never  passed  through  any  reli- 
gious experiences,  but  they  would  no  more  have 
dreamed  of  not  rendering  unto  God  what  was  God's 
than  they  would  have  neglected  to  pay  their  taxes. 
Therefore  they  said  their  evening  prayers,  went  to 
church  at  Easter  and  Whitsun,  sang  their  hymns 
on  Christmas  Eve,  and  partook  of  the  Lord's  Sup- 
per twice  a  year.  They  had  no  particular  thirst  for 
knowledge.  As  for  their  love  of  beauty,  they  were 
by  no  means  insensible  to  the  charm  of  little  senti- 
mental ditties,  and  when  summer  came  with  thick, 
luscious  grass  in  the  meadows  and  grain  sprouting 
in  broad  fields,  they  would  sometimes  say  to  one 
another  that  this  was  a  fine  time  for  travelling  about 
the  country,  but  their  natures  had  nothing  of  the 
poetic;  beauty  never  stirred  any  raptures  in  them, 
and  they  were  never  visited  by  vague  longings  or 
day-dreams. 

Bartholine  was  not  of  their  kind.  She  had  no 
interest  in  the  affairs  of  the  fields  and  the  stables, 
no  taste  for  the  dairy  and  the  kitchen  —  none  what- 
ever. 

She  loved  poetry. 

She  lived  on  poems,  dreamed  poems,  and  put 
her  faith  in  them  above  everything  else  in  the  world. 


CHAPTER  r  5 

Parents,  sisters  and  brothers,  neighbors  and  friends 
—  none  of  them  ever  said  a  word  that  was  worth 
listening  to.  Their  thoughts  never  rose  above  their 
land  and  their  business;  their  eyes  never  sought 
anything  beyond  the  conditions  and  affairs  that 
were  right  before  them. 

But  the  poems!  They  teemed  with  new  ideas 
and  profound  truths  about  life  in  the  great  outside 
world,  where  grief  was  black,  and  joy  was  red;  they 
glowed  with  images,  foamed  and  sparkled  with 
rhythm  and  rhyme.  They  were  all  about  young 
girls,  and  the  girls  were  noble  and  beautiful  —  how 
noble  and  beautiful  they  never  knew  themselves. 
Their  hearts  and  their  love  meant  more  than  the 
wealth  of  all  the  earth;  men  bore  them  up  in  their 
hands,  lifted  them  high  in  the  sunshine  of  joy, 
honored  and  worshipped  them,  and  were  delighted 
to  share  with  them  their  thoughts  and  plans,  their 
triumphs  and  renown.  They  would  even  say  that 
these  same  fortunate  girls  had  inspired  all  the  plans 
and  achieved  all  the  triumphs. 

Why  might  not  she  herself  be  such  a  girl?  They 
were  thus  and  so  —  and  they  never  knew  it  them- 
selves. How  was  she  to  know  what  she  really  was? 
And  the  poets  all  said  very  plainly  that  this  was  life, 
and  that  it  was  not  life  to  sit  and  sew,  work  about 
the  house,  and  make  stupid  calls. 

When  all  this  was  sifted  down,  it  meant  little 
beyond  a  slightly  morbid  desire  to  realize  herself. 


6  NIELS  LYHNE 

a  longing  to  find  herself,  which  she  had  in  common 
with  many  other  young  girls  with  talents  a  littk 
above  the  ordinary.  It  was  only  a  pity  that  there 
was  not  in  her  circle  a  single  individual  of  suffi- 
cient distinction  to  give  her  the  measure  of  her  own 
powers.  There  was  not  even  a  kindred  nature.  So 
she  came  to  look  upon  herself  as  something  won- 
derful, unique,  a  sort  of  exotic  plant  that  had  grown 
in  these  ungentle  climes  and  had  barely  strength 
enough  to  unfold  its  leaves ;  though  in  more  genial 
warmth,  under  a  more  powerful  sun,  it  might  have 
shot  up,  straight  and  tall,  with  a  gloriously  rich  and 
brilliant  bloom.  Such  was  the  image  of  her  real  self 
that  she  carried  in  her  mind.  She  dreamed  a  thou- 
sand dreams  of  those  sunlit  regions  and  was  con- 
sumed with  longing  for  this  other  and  richer  self, 
forgetting — what  is  so  easily  forgotten — that  even 
the  fairest  dreams  and  the  deepest  longings  do  not 
add  an  inch  to  the  stature  of  the  human  soul. 

One  fine  day  a  suitor  came  to  her. 

Young  Lyhne  of  Lonborggaard  was  the  man, 
and  he  was  the  last  male  scion  of  a  family  whose 
members  had  for  three  generations  been  among  the 
most  distinguished  people  in  the  county.  As  bur- 
gomasters, revenue-tollectors,  or  royal  commis- 
sioners, often  rewarded  with  the  title  of  councillor 
of  justice,  the  Lyhnes  in  their  maturer  years  had 
served  king  and  country  with  diligence  and  honor. 


CHAPTER  I  7 

In  their  younger  days  they  had  travelled  in  France 
and  Germany,  and  these  trips,  carefully  planned 
and  carried  out  with  great  thoroughness,  had  en- 
riched their  receptive  minds  with  all  the  scenes  of 
beauty  and  the  knowledge  of  life  that  foreign  lands 
had  to  offer.  Nor  were  these  years  of  travel  pushed 
into  the  background,  after  their  return,  as  mere 
reminiscences,  like  the  memory  of  a  feast  after  the 
last  candle  has  burned  down  and  the  last  note  of 
music  has  died  away.  No,  life  in  their  homes  was 
built  on  these  years;  the  tastes  awakened  in  this 
manner  were  not  allowed  to  languish,  but  were  nour- 
ished and  developed  by  every  means  at  their  com- 
mand. Rare  copper  plates,  costly  bronzes,  German 
poetry,  French  juridical  works,  and  French  philo- 
sophy were  every-day  matters  and  common  topics 
in  the  Lyhne  households. 

Their  bearing  had  an  old-fashioned  ease,  a  courtly' 
graciousness,  which  contrasted  oddly  with  the  heavy 
majesty  and  awkward  pomposity  of  the  other 
county  families.  Their  speech  was  well  rounded, 
delicately  precise,  a  little  marred,  perhaps,  by  rhe- 
torical affectation,  yet  it  somehow  went  well  with 
those  large,  broad  figures  with  their  domelike  fore- 
heads, their  bushy  hair  growing  far  back  on  their 
temples,  their  calm,  smiling  eyes,  and  slightly  aqui- 
line noses.  The  lower  part  of  the  face  was  too  heavy, 
however,  the  mouth  too  wide,  and  the  lips  much 
too  full. 


8  NIELS  LYHNE 

Young  Lyhne  showed  all  these  physical  traits, 
but  more  faintly,  and,  in  the  same  manner,  the 
family  intelligence  seemed  to  have  grown  weary  in 
him.  None  of  the  mental  problems  or  finer  artistic 
enjoyments  that  he  encountered  stirred  him  to  any 
zeal  or  desire  whatsoever.  He  had  simply  striven 
with  them  in  a  painstaking  effort  which  was  never 
brightened  by  joy  in  feeling  his  own  powers  unfold 
or  pride  in  finding  them  adequate.  Mere  satisfac- 
tion in  a  task  accomplished  was  the  only  reward 
that  came  to  him. 

His  estate,  Lonborggaard,  had  been  left  him  by 
an  uncle  who  had  recently  died,  and  he  had  returned 
from  the  traditional  trip  abroad  in  order  to  take 
over  the  management.  As  the  Blid  family  were  the 
nearest  neighbors  of  his  own  rank,  and  his  uncle 
had  been  intimate  with  them,  he  called,  met  Bar- 
holine,  and  fell  in  love  with  her. 

That  she  should  fall  in  love  with  him  was  almost 
a  foregone  conclusion. 

Here  at  last  was  some  one  from  the  outside 
world,  some  one  who  had  lived  in  great,  distant 
cities,  where  forests  of  spires  were  etched  on  a  sun- 
lit sky,  where  the  air  was  vibrant  with  the  chimes 
of  bells,  the  pealing  of  organs,  and  the  twanging  of 
mandolins,  while  festal  processions,  resplendent 
with  gold  and  colors,  wound  their  way  through 
broad  streets ;  where  marble  mansions  shone,  where 
noble  families   flaunted  bright  escutcheons  hung 


f 


CHAPTER  I  9 

two  by  two  over  wide  portals,  while  fans  flashed,  and 
veils  fluttered  over  the  sculptured  vines  of  curv- 
ing balconies.  Here  was  one  who  had  sojourned 
where  victorious  armies  had  tramped  the  roads, 
where  tremendous  battles  had  invested  the  names 
of  villages  and  fields  with  immortal  fame,  where 
smoke  rising  from  gipsy  fires  trailed  over  the  leafy 
masses  of  the  forest,  where  red  ruins  looked  down 
from  vine-wreathed  hills  into  the  smiling  valley, 
while  water  surged  ovej;  the  mill-wheel,  and  cow- 
bells tinkled  as  the  herds  came  home  over  wide- 
arched  bridges. 

All  these  things  he  told  about,  not  as  the  poems 
did,  but  in  a  matter-of-fact  way,  as  familiarly  as  the 
people  at  home  talked  about  the  villages  in  their 
own  county  or  the  next  parish.  He  talked  of  painters 
and  poets,  too,  and  sometimes  he  would  laud  to  the 
skies  a  name  that  she  had  never  even  heard.  He 
showed  her  their  pictures  and  read  their  poems  to 
her  in  the  garden  or  on  the  hill  where  they  could 
look  out  over  the  bright  waters  of  the  fjord  and  the 
brown,  billowing  heath.  Love  made  him  poetic;  the 
view  took  on  beauty,  the  clouds  seemed  like  those 
drifting  through  the  poems,  and  the  trees  were 
clothed  in  the  leaves  rustling  so  mournfully  in  the 
ballads. 

Bartholine  was  happy;  for  her  love  enabled  her 
to  dissolve  the  twenty-four  hours  into  a  string  of 
romantic  episodes.  It  was  romance  when  she  went 


lo  NIELS  LYHNE 

down  the  road  to  meet  him;  their  meeting  was  ro- 
mance, and  so  was  their  parting.  It  was  romance 
when  she  stood  on  the  hilltop  in  the  light  of  the  set- 
ting sun  and  waved  him  one  last  farewell  before  go- 
ing up  to  her  quiet  little  chamber,  wistfully  happy, 
to  give  herself  up  to  thoughts  of  him;  and  when  she 
included  his  name  in  her  evening  prayer,  that  was 
romance,  too. 

She  no  longer  felt  the  old  vague  desires  and  long- 
ings. The  new  life  with  i^  shifting  moods  gave 
her  all  she  craved,  and  moreover  her  thoughts  and 
ideas  had  been  clarified  through  having  some  one  to 
whom  she  could  speak  freely  without  fear  of  being 
misunderstood. 

She  was  changed  in  another  way,  too.  Happiness 
had  made  her  more  amiable  toward  her  parents  and 
sisters  and  brothers.  She  discovered  that,  after  all, 
they  had  more  intelligence  than  she  had  supposed 
and  more  feeling. 

And  so  they  were  married. 

The  first  year  passed  very  much  as  their  court- 
ship; but  when  their  wedded  life  had  lost  its  new- 
ness, Lyhne  could  no  longer  conceal  from  himself 
that  he  wearied  of  always  seeking  new  expressions 
for  his  love.  He  was  tired  of  donning  the  plumage 
of  romance  and  eternally  spreading  his  wings  to 
fly  through  all  the  heavens  of  sentiment  and  all 
the  abysses  of  thought.  He  longed  to  settle  peace- 
fully on  his  own  quiet  perch  and  drowse,  with  his 


CHAPTER  I  X  II 

tired  head  under  the  soft,  feathery  shelter  of  a  wing. 
He  had  never  conceived  of  love  as  an  ever-wakeful, 
restless  flame,  casting  its  strong,  flickering  light  into 
every  nook  and  corner  of  existence,  making  every- 
thing seem  fantastically  large  and  strange.  Love  to 
him  was  more  like  the  quiet  glow  of  embers  on  their 
bed  of  ashes,  spreading  a  gentle  warmth,  while  the 
faint  dusk  wraps  all  distant  things  in  forgetfulness 
and  makes  the  near  seem  nearer  and  more  intimate. 

He  was  tired,  worn  exit.  He  could  not  stand  all 
this  romance.  He  longed  for  the  firm  support  of 
the  commonplace  under  his  feet,  as  a  fish,  suflFo- 
cating  in  hot  air,  languishes  for  the  clear,  fresh  cool- 
ness of  the  waves.  It  must  end  sometime,  when  it 
had  run  its  course.  Bartholine  was  no  longer  inex- 
perienced either  in  life  or  books.  She  knew  them 
as  well  as  he.  He  had  given  her  all  he  had  —  and 
now  he  was  expected  to  go  on  giving.  It  was  im- 
possible; he  had  nothing  more.  There  was  only  one 
comfort:  Bartholine  was  with  child. 

Bartholine  had  long  realized  with  sorrow  that  her 
conception  of  Lyhne  was  changing  little  by  little, 
and  that  he  no  longer  stood  on  the  dizzy  pinnacle 
to  which  she  had  raised  him  in  the  days  of  their 
courtship.  While  she  did  not  yet  doubt  that  he  was 
at  bottom  what  she  called  a  poetic  nature,  she  had 
begun  to  feel  a  little  uneasy;  for  the  cloven  hoof  of 
prose  had  shown  itself  once  and  again.  This  only 
made  her  pursue  romance  the  more  ardently,  and 


12  NIELS  LYHNE 

she  tried  to  bring  back  the  old  state  of  things  by 
lavishing  on  him  a  still  greater  wealth  of  sentiment 
and  a  still  greater  rapture,  but  she  met  so  little  re- 
sponse that  she  almost  felt  as  if  she  were  stilted 
and  unnatural.  For  awhile  she  tried  to  drag  Lyhne 
with  her,  in  spite  of  his  resistance;  she  refused 
to  accept  what  she  suspected;  but  when,  at  last, 
the  failure  of  her  efforts  made  her  begin  to  doubt 
whether  her  own  mind  and  heart  really  possessed 
the  treasures  she  had  imagined,  then  she  suddenly 
left  him  alone,  became  cool,  silent,  and  reserved, 
and  often  went  off  by  herself  to  grieve  over  her  lost 
illusions.  For  she  saw  it  all  now,  and  was  bitterly 
disappointed  to  find  that  Lyhne,  in  his  inmost  self, 
was  no  whit  different  from  the  people  she  used  to 
live  among.  She  had  merely  been  deceived  by  the 
very  ordinary  fact  that  his  love,  for  a  brief  moment, 
had  invested  him  with  a  fleeting  glamor  of  soul- 
fulness  and  exaltation — a  very  common  occurrence 
with  persons  of  a  lower  nature. 

Lyhne  was  grieved  and  anxious,  too,  over  the 
change  in  their  relationship,  and  he  tried  to  mend 
matters  by  unlucky  attempts  at  the  old  romantic 
flights,  but  it  all  availed  nothing  except  to  show 
Bartholine  yet  more  clearly  how  great  had  been  her 
mistake. 

Such  was  the  state  of  things  between  man  and 
wife  when  Bartholine  brought  forth  her  first  child. 
It  was  a  boy,  and  they  called  him  Niels. 


Chapter  II 

IN  a  way,  the  child  brought  the  parents  together 
again.  Over  his  Httle  cradle  they  would  meet  in 
a  common  hope,  a  common  joy,  and  a  common 
fear;  of  him  they  would  think,  and  of  him  they 
would  talk,  each  as  often  and  as  readily  as  the  other, 
and  each  was  grateful  to  the  other  for  the  child  and 
for  all  the  happiness  and  love  he  brought. 

Yet  they  were  still  far  apart. 

Lyhne  was  quite  absorbed  in  his  farming  and  the 
affairs  of  the  parish.  Not  that  he  took  the  position 
of  a  leader  or  even  of  a  reformer,  but  he  gave  scru- 
pulous attention  to  the  existing  order  of  things, 
looked  on  as  an  interested  spectator,  and  carried 
out  the  cautious  improvements  recommended,  after 
deliberate — very  deliberate — consideration,  by  his 
old  head  servant  or  the  elders  of  the  parish. 

It  never  occurred  to  him  to  make  any  use  of  the 
knowledge  he  had  acquired  in  earlier  days.  He  had 
too  little  faith  in  what  he  called  theories  and  far  too 
great  respect  for  the  time-hallowed,  venerable  dog- 
mas of  experience  which  other  people  called  prac- 
tical. In  fact,  there  was  nothing  about  him  to  indi- 
cate that  he  had  not  lived  here  and  lived  thus  all 
his  life — except  one  little  trait.  He  had  a  habit  of 
sitting  for  half  hours  at  a  time,  quite  motionless, 
on  a  stile  or  a  boundary  stone,  looking  out  over  the 
luscious  green  rye  or  the  golden  top-heavy  oats,  in 


14  NIELS  LYHNE 

a  strange,  vegetative  trance.  This  was  of  the  old 
Lyhne,  the  young  Lyhne. 

Bartholine,  in  her  world,  was  by  no  means  so 
ready  to  adapt  herself  quickly  and  with  a  good 
grace.  No,  she  first  had  to  voice  her  sorrow  through 
the  verses  of  a  hundred  poets,  lamenting,  in  all  the 
broad  generalities  of  the  period,  the  thousands  of 
barriers  and  fetters  that  oppress  humanity.  Some- 
times her  lament  would  be  clothed  in  lofty  indigna- 
tion, flinging  its  wordy  froth  against  the  thrones  of 
emperors  and  the  dungeons  of  tyrants;  sometimes 
it  would  take  the  form  of  a  calm,  pitying  sorrow, 
looking  on  as  the  effulgent  light  of  beauty  faded 
from  a  blind  and  slavish  generation  cowed  and 
broken  by  the  soulless  bustle  of  the  day ;  then  again 
it  would  appear  only  as  a  gentle  sigh  for  the  freedom 
of  the  bird  in  its  flight  and  of  the  cloud  driftrng 
lightly  into  the  distance. 

At  last  she  grew  tired  of  lamenting,  and  the  im- 
potence of  her  grief  goaded  her  into  doubt  and  bit- 
terness. Like  worshippers  who  beat  their  saint  and 
tread  him  under  foot  when  he  refuses  to  show  his 
power,  she  would  scoff  at  the  romance  she  once 
idolized,  and  scornfully  ask  herself  whether  she  did 
not  expect  the  bird  Roc  to  appear  presently  in  the 
cucumber  bed,  or  Aladdin's  cave  to  open  under  the 
floor  of  the  milk  cellar.  She  would  answer  herself 
in  a  sort  of  childish  cynicism,  pretending  that  the 
world  was  excessively  prosaic,  calling  the  moon 


CHAPTER  II  15 

green  cheese  and  the  roses  potpourri,  all  with  a 
sense  of  taking  revenge  and  at  the  same  time  with 
a  half  uneasy,  half  fascinated  feeling  that  she  was 
committing  blasphemy. 

These  attempts  at  setting  herself  free  were  futile. 
She  sank  back  into  the  dreams  of  her  girlhood,  but 
with  the  difference  that  now  they  were  no  longer 
illumined  by  hope.  Moreover,  she  had  learned  that 
they  were  only  dreams — distant,  illusive  dreams, 
which  no  longing  in  the  world  could  ever  draw 
down  to  her  earth.  When  she  abandoned  herself  to 
them  now,  it  was  with  a  sense  of  weariness,  while 
an  accusing  inner  voice  told  her  that  she  was  like 
the  drunkard  who  knows  that  his  passion  is  de- 
stroying him,  that  every  debauch  means  strength 
taken  from  his  weakness  and  added  to  the  power 
of  his  desire.  But  the  voice  sounded  in  vain,  for  a 
life  soberly  lived,  without  the  fair  vice  of  dreams, 
was  no  life  at  all — life  had  exactly  the  value  that 
dreams  gave  it  and  no  more. 

So  widely  different,  then,  were  Niels  Lyhne's 
father  and  mother,  the  two  friendly  powers  that 
struggled  unconsciously  for  mastery  over  his  young 
soul  from  the  moment  the  first  gleam  of  intelli- 
gence in  him  gave  them  something  to  work  on.  As 
the  child  grew  older,  the  struggle  became  more 
intense  and  was  waged  with  a  greater  variety  of 
weapons. 

The  faculty  in  the  boy  through  which  the  mother 


i6  NIELS  LYHNE 

tried  to  influence  him  was  his  imagination.  He  had 
plenty  of  imagination,  but  even  when  he  was  a  very 
Ismail  boy,  it  was  evident  that  he  felt  a  great  diff^er- 
ence  between  the  fairy  world  his  mother's  words 
'conjured  up  and  the  world  that  really  existed.  Often 
his  mother  would  tell  him  stories  and  describe  the 
woeful  plight  of  the  hero,  until  Niels  could  not 
see  any  way  out  of  all  this  trouble,  and  could  not 
understand  how  the  misery  closing  like  an  impene- 
trable wall  tighter  and  tighter  around  him  and  the 
hero  could  be  overcome.  Then  it  happened  more 
than  eleven  times  that  he  would  suddenly  press 
his  cheek  against  his  mother's  and  whisper,  with 
eyes  full  of  tears  and  lips  trembling,  "  But  it  is  n't 
7'eally  true?"  And  when  he  had  received  the  com- 
forting answer  he  wanted,  he  would  heave  a  deep 
sigh  of  relief  and  settle  down  contentedly  to  listen 
to  the  end. 

His  mother  did  not  quite  like  this  defection. 

When  he  grew  too  old  for  fairy  tales,  and  she  tired 
of  inventing  them,  she  would  tell  him,  with  some 
embroideries  of  her  own,  about  the  heroes  of  war 
and  peace,  choosing  those  that  lent  themselves  to 
pointing  a  moral  about  the  power  dwelling  in  a 
human  soul  when  it  wills  one  thing  only  and  neither 
allows  itself  to  be  discouraged  by  the  short-sighted 
doubts  of  the  moment  nor  to  be  enticed  into  a  soft, 
enervating  peace. 

All  her  stories  went  to  this  tune,  and  when  his- 


CHAPTER  II  17 

tory  had  no  more  heroes  that  suited  her,  she  chose 
an  imaginary  hero,  one  whose  deeds  and  fate  she 
could  shape  as  she  pleased  —  a  hero  after  her  own 
heart,  spirit  of  her  spirit,  ay,  flesh  of  her  flesh  and 
blood  of  hers  too. 

A  few  years  after  Niels  was  born,  she  had  brought 
forth  a  still-born  boy  child,  and  him  she  chose. 
All  that  he  might  have  been  and  done  she  served 
up  before  his  brother  in  a  confused  medley  of  Pro- 
methean longings.  Messianic  courage,  and  Hercu- 
lean might,  with  a  naive  travesty,  a  monstrous  dis- 
tortion, a  world  of  cheap  fantasies,  having  no  more 
body  of  reality  than  had  the  tiny  little  skeleton 
mouldering  in  the  earth  of  Lonborg  graveyard. 

Niels  was  not  deceived  about  the  moral  of  all 
these  tales.  He  realized  perfectly  that  it  was  con- 
temptible to  be  like  ordinary  people,  and  he  was 
quite  ready  to  submit  to  the  hard  fate  that  be- 
longed to  heroes.  In  imagination  he  willingly  suf- 
fered the  wearisome  struggles,  the  ill  fortune,  the 
martyrdom  of  being  misjudged,  and  the  victories 
without  peace;  but  at  the  same  time  he  felt  a  won- 
drous relief  in  thinking  that  it  was  so  far  away,  that 
nothing  of  all  this  would  happen  before  he  was 
grown  up. 

As  the  dream-figures  and  dream-tones  of  night 
may  walk  abroad  in  the  wakeful  day  like  vapory 
forms,  mere  shadows  of  sound,  calling  on  thought 
and  holding  it  for  a  fleeting  second,  as  it  listens 


i8  NIELS  LYHNE 

and  wonders  whether  any  one  really  called — so  the 
images  of  that  dream-born  future  whispered  softly 
I'through  Niels  Lyhne's  childhood,  reminding  him 
gently  but  ceaselessly  of  the  fact  that  there  was  a 
limit  set  to  this  happy  time,  and  that  presently  one 
day  it  would  be  no  more. 

This  consciousness  roused  in  him  a  craving 
to  enjoy  his  childhood  to  the  full,  to  suck  it  up 
through  every  sense,  not  to  spill  a  drop,  not  a 
single  one.  Therefore  his  play  had  an  intensity, 
sometimes  lashed  into  a  passion,  under  the  press- 
ure of  an  uneasy  sense  that  time  was  flowing  away 
from  him  before  he  could  gather  from  its  treasure- 
laden  waters  all  they  brought,  as  one  wave  broke 
upon  another.  He  would  sometimes  throw  himself 
down  on  the  ground  and  sob  with  despair  when  a 
holiday  hung  heavy  on  his  hands  for  the  lack  of 
one  thing  or  another — playmates,  inventiveness, 
or  fair  weather — and  he  hated  to  go  to  bed,  be- 
cause sleep  was  empty  of  events  and  devoid  of 
sensation. 

Yet  it  was  not  always  so. 

It  would  sometimes  happen  that  he  grew  weary, 
and  his  imagination  ran  out  of  colors.  Then  he 
would  be  quite  wretched  and  feel  that  he  was  too 
small  and  insignificant  for  these  ambitious  dreams. 
He  seemed  to  himself  a  mean  liar,  who  had  bra- 
zenly pretended  to  love  and  understand  what  was 
great,  though,  if  the  truth  were  told,  he  cared  only 


CHAPTER  II  --19 

for  the  petty,  loved  only  the  commonplace,  and 
carried  all,  all  low-born  wishes  and  desires  fully 
alive  within  him.  Sometimes  he  would  even  feel 
that  he  had  the  class-hatred  of  the  rabble  against 
everything  exalted,  and  that  he  would  joyfully  have 
helped  to  stone  these  heroes  who  were  of  a  better 
blood  than  he  and  knew  that  they  were. 

On  such  days,  he  would  shun  his  mother,  and, 
with  a  sense  of  following  an  ignoble  instinct,  would 
seek  his  father,  turning  a  willing  ear  and  receptive 
mind  to  the  latter's  earth-bound  thoughts  and 
matter-of-fact  explanations.  He  felt  at  home  with 
his  father  and  rejoiced  in  the  likeness  between  them, 
well-nigh  forgetting  that  it  was  the  same  father 
whom  he  was  wont  to  look  down  upon  with  pity 
from  the  pinnacles  of  his  dream-castle.  Of  course 
this  was  not  present  in  his  childish  mind  with  the 
clearness  and  definiteness  given  it  by  the  spoken 
word,  but  it  was  all  there,  though  unformed,  un- 
born, in  a  vague  and  intangible  embryo  form.  It  was 
like  the  curious  vegetation  at  the  bottom  of  the 
sea  when  seen  through  layers  of  ice.  Break  the  ice, 
or  draw  that  which  lives  in  the  dimness  out  into  the 
full  light  of  speech — what  happens  is  the  same: 
that  which  is  now  seen  and  now  grasped  is  not,  in 
its  clearness,  the  shadowy  thing  that  was. 


Chapter  III 

THE  years  passed.  One  Christmas  trod  upon 
the  heels  of  another,  leaving  the  air  bright 
with  its  festive  glow  till  long  after  Epiphany.  Whit- 
sun  after  Whitsun  scampered  over  flower-decked 
meadows.  One  summer  holiday  after  another  drew 
near,  celebrated  its  orgie  of  fresh  air  and  sunshine, 
poured  out  its  fiery  wine  from  brimming  goblets, 
and  then  vanished,  one  day,  in  a  sinking  sun ;  only 
memory  lingered  with  sunburnt  cheek  and  won- 
dering eyes  and  blood  that  danced. 

The  years  had  passed,  and  the  world  was  no 
longer  the  realm  of  wonder  that  it  had  been.  The 
dim  recesses  behind  the  mouldering  elder-bushes, 
the  mysterious  attic  rooms,  the  gloomy  stone  pass- 
age under  the  Klastrup  road  —  fancied  terrors  that 
once  thrilled  him  no  longer  lurked  there.  The  hill- 
side that  bloomed  at  the  first  trill  of  the  lark,  hiding 
the  grass  under  starry,  purple-rimmed  daisies  and 
yellow  buttercups,  the  fantastic  wealth  of  animals 
and  plants  in  the  river,  the  wild  precipices  of  the 
sand-pit,  its  black  rocks  and  bits  of  silvery  granite 
—  all  these  were  just  flowers,  animals,  and  stones ; 
the  shining  fairy  gold  had  turned  into  withered 
leaves  again. 

One  gameafter  another  grew  old  snri  silly,  stupid 
and  tiresome  like  the  pictures  in  tne  n.  B  C,  and 
yet  they  had  once  been  new,  inexhaustibly  new. 


CHAPTER  III  21 

Here  they  used  to  roll  a  barrel-hoop  —  Niels  and 
the  pastor's  Frithjof — and  the  hoop  was  a  ship, 
which  was  wrecked  when  it  toppled  over,  but  if  you 
caught  it  before  it  fell,  then  it  was  casting  anchor. 
The  narrow  passage  between  the  outhouses,  where 
you  could  hardly  squeeze  through,  was  Bab-el- 
Mandeb  or  the  Portal  of  Death.  On  the  stable  door 
"England"  was  written  in  chalk,  and  on  the  barn 
door  "France."  The  garden  gate  was  Rio  Janeiro, 
but  the  smithy  was  Brazil.  Another  game  was  to 
play  Holger  the  Dane:  you  could  play  it  among  the 
tall  burs  behind  the  barn;  but  if  you  went  up  in  the 
miller's  pasture,  there  were  two  sink-holes  known 
as  the  gorges,  and  there  were  the  haunts  of  the 
veritable  Prince  Burmand  and  his  wild  Saracens, 
with  reddish  gray  turbans  and  yellow  plumes  in 
their  helmets  —  burdocks  and  Aaron's  rod  of  the 
tallest.  That  was  the  only  real  Mauretania.  That 
rank,  succulent  growth,  that  teeming  mass  of  ex- 
uberant plant-life,  excited  their  lust  of  destruc- 
tion and  intoxicated  them  with  the  voluptuous  joy 
of  demolishing.  The  wooden  swords  gleamed  with 
the  brightness  of  steel;  the  green  sap  stained  the 
blade  with  red  gore,  and  the  cut  stalks  squashing 
under  their  feet  were  Turks'  bodies  trampled  under 
horses'  hoofs  with  a  sound  as  of  bones  crunched  in 
flesh. 

Sometimes  they  played  down  by  the  fjord :  mus- 
sel-shells were  launched  as  ships,  and  when  the 


22  NIELS  LYHNE 

vessel  got  stuck  in  a  clump  of  seaweed,  or  went 
aground  on  a  sand-bank,  it  was  Columbus  in  the 
Sargasso  Sea  or  the  discovery  of  America.  Harbors 
and  mighty  embankments  were  built;  the  Nile  was 
dug  out  in  the  firm  beach  sand,  and  once  they 
made  Gurre  Castle  out  of  pebbles  —  a  tiny  dead 
fish  in  an  oyster-shell  was  the  corpse  of  Tove,  and 
they  were  King  Valdemar  who  sat  sorrowing  by  her 
side. 

But  this  was  all  past. 

Niels  was  quite  a  lad  now,  twelve  years  old, 
nearing  thirteen,  and  he  no  longer  needed  to  hack 
thistles  and  burdocks  in  order  to  feed  his  knightly 
fancies,  any  more  than  he  had  to  launch  his  ex- 
plorer's dreams  in  a  mussel-shell.  A  book  and  a 
corner  of  the  sofa  were  enough  for  him  now,  and 
if  the  book  refused  to  bear  him  to  the  coast  of  his 
desires,  he  would  hunt  up  Frithjof  and  tell  him 
the  tale  which  the  book  would  not  yield.  Arm  in 
arm,  they  would  saunter  down  the  road,  one  telling, 
both  listening;  but  when  they  wanted  to  revel  to 
the  full  and  really  give  their  imagination  free  play, 
they  would  hide  in  the  fragrant  dimness  of  the  hay- 
loft. After  a  while,  these  stories,  which  always  ended 
just  when  you  had  really  entered  into  them,  grew 
into  a  single  long  story  that  never  ended,  but  lived 
and  died  with  one  generation  after  the  other;  for 
when  the  hero  had  grown  old,  or  you  had  been 
careless  enough  to  let  him  die,  you  could  always 


CHAPTER  III  23 

give  him  a  son,  who  would  inherit  everything  from 
the  father,  and  whom,  in  addition,  you  could  dower 
with  any  other  virtues  that  you  happened  to  value 
particularly  just  at  the  moment. 

Whatever  stamped  itself  on  Niels's  mind,  what 
he  saw,  what  he  understood  and  what  he  misunder- 
stood^^hat  he  admired  and  what  he  knew  he  ought 
to  admirey-all  was  woven  into  the  story.  As  running 
water  is  colored  by  every  passing  picture,  sometimes 
holding  the  image  with  perfect  clearness,  sometimes 
distorting  it  or  throwing  it  back  in  wavering,  un- 
certain lines,  then  again  drowning  it  completely  in 
the  color  and  play  of  its  own  ripples,  so  the  lad's 
story  reflected  feelings  and  thoughts,  his  own  and 
those  of  other  people,  mirrored  human  beings  and 
events,  life  and  books,  as  well  as  it  could.  It  was  a 
play  life,  running  side  by  side  with  real  life.  It  was 
a  snug  retreat,  where  you  could  abandon  yourself 
to  dreams  of  the  wildest  adventures.  It  was  a  fairy 
garden  that  opened  at  your  slightest  nod,  and  re- 
ceived you  in  all  its  glory,  shutting  out  everybody 
else.  Whispering  palms  closed  overhead;  flowers 
of  sunshine  and  leaves  like  stars  on  vines  of  coral 
spread  at  your  feet,  and  among  them  a  thousand 
paths  led  to  all  the  ages  and  the  climes.  If  you 
followed  one,  it  would  lead  you  to  one  place,  and 
if  you  followed  another,  it  would  lead  you  to  an- 
other place,  to  Aladdin  and  Robinson  Crusoe,  to 
Vaulunder  and  Henrik  Magnard,  to  Niels  Klim 


24  NIELS  LYHNE 

and  Mungo  Park,  to  Peter  Simple  and  Odysseus 
—  and  the  moment  you  wished  it,  you  were  home 
again. 

About  a  month  after  Niels's  twelfth  birthday, 
'^    two  new  faces  appeared  at  Lonborggaard. 
V       One  was  that  of  the  new  tutor;  the  other  was 
that  of  Edele  Lyhne, 

The  tutor,  Mr.  Bigum,  was  a  candidate  for  or- 
ders and  was  at  the  threshold  of  the  forties.  He 
was  rather  small,  but  with  a  stocky  strength  like 
that  of  a  work-horse,  broad-chested,  high-shoul- 
dered, and  slightly  stooping.  He  walked  with  a 
heavy,  slow,  deliberate  tread,  and  moved  his  arms 
in  a  vague,  expressionless  way  that  seemed  to  re- 
quire a  great  deal  of  room.  His  high,  wide  fore- 
head was  flat  as  a  wall,  with  two  perpendicular  lines 
between  the  eyebrows;  the  nose  was  short  and  blunt, 
the  mouth  large  with  thick,  fresh  lips.  His  eyes 
were  his  best  feature,  light  in  color,  mild,  and  clear. 
The  movements  of  his  eye-balls  showed  that  he 
was  slightly  deaf.  Nevertheless,  he  loved  music  and 
played  his  violin  with  passionate  devotion;  for  the 
notes,  he  said,  were  not  heard  only  with  the  ears, 
but  with  the  whole  body,  eyes,  fingers,  and  feet; 
if  the  ear  failed  sometimes,  the  hand  would  find 
the  right  note  without  its  aid,  by  a  strange,  intui- 
tive genius  of  its  own.  Besides,  the  audible  tones 
were,  after  all,  false,  but  he  who  possessed  the  di- 
vine gift  of  music  carried  within  him  an  invisible 


CHAPTER  III  25 

instrument  compared  to  which  the  most  wonder- 
ful Cremona  was  Hke  the  stringed  calabash  of  the 
savage.  On  this  instrument  the  soul  played;  its 
strings  gave  forth  ideal  notes,  and  upon  it  the 
great  tone-poets  had  composed  their  immortal 
works. 

The  external  music,  which  was  borne  on  the  air 
of  reality  and  heard  with  the  ears,  was  nothing  but 
a  wretched  simulation,  a  stammering  attempt  to  say 
the  unutterable.  It  resembled  the  music  of  the  soul 
as  the  statue  modelled  by  hands,  carved  with  a 
chisel,  and  meted  with  a  measure  resembled  the 
wondrous  marble  dream  of  the  sculptor  which  no 
eye  ever  beheld  and  no  lip  ever  praised. 

Music,  however,  was  by  no  means  Mr.  Bigum's 
chief  interest.  He  was  first  of  all  a  philosopher,  but 
not  one  of  the  productive  philosophers  who  find 
new  laws  and  build  new  systems.  He  laughed  at 
their  systems,  the  snail-shells  in  which  they  dragged 
themselves  across  the  illimitable  field  of  thought, 
fondly  imagining  that  the  field  was  within  the  snail- 
shell!  And  these  laws  —  laws  of  thought,  laws  of 
nature!  Why,  the  discovery  of  a  law  meant  noth- 
ing but  the  fixing  of  your  own  limitations:  I  can 
see  so  far  and  no  farther  —  as  if  there  were  not  an- 
other horizon  beyond  the  first,  and  another  and  yet 
another,  horizon  beyond  horizon,  law  beyond  law, 
in  an  unending  vista!  No,  he  was  not  that  kind  of 
a  philosopher.  He  did  not  think  he  was  vain,  or 


26  NIELS  LYHNE 

that  he  overvalued  himself,  but  he  could  not  close 
his  eyes  to  the  fact  that  his  intellect  had  a  wider 
span  than  that  of  other  mortals.  When  he  medi- 
tatedupontheworksofthe  great  thinkers,  it  seemed 
to  him  that  he  strode  forward  through  a  region 
peopled  by  slumbering  thought-giants,  who  awoke, 
bathed  in  the  light  of  his  spirit,  to  consciousness 
of  their  own  strength.  And  so  it  was  alwavs;  every 
thought,  mood,  or  sentiment  of  another  person 
which  was  vouchsafed  the  privilege  of  awakening 
within  him  rose  up  with  his  sign  on  its  forehead, en- 
nobled, purified,  with  wings  strengthened,  endowed 
with  a  power  and  a  might  that  its  creator  had  never 
dreamed  of. 

How  often  had  he  gazed  with  an  almost  hum- 
ble amazement  on  the  marvellous  wealth  of  his 
soul  and  the  divine  assurance  of  his  spirit!  For  it 
would  often  happen  that  different  days  would  find 
him  judging  the  world  and  the  things  of  the  world 
frorn  entirely  divergent  points  of  view,  looking  at 
them  through  hypotheses  that  were  as  far  apart 
as  night  and  morning;  yet  these  points  of  view  and 
hypotheses,  which  he  chose  to  make  his  own,  never 
even  tor  one  second  made  him  theirs,  anv  more 
than  the  god  who  has  taken  on  the  semblance  of 
a  bull  or  a  swan  becomes  a  bull  or  a  swan  and  ceases 
to  be  a  god. 

And  no  one  suspected  what  dwelt  within  him  — 
all  passed  him  bv  unseeing.  But  he  rejoiced  in  their 


CHAPTER  III  27 

blindness  and  felt  his  contempt  for  humanity  grow- 
ing. A  day  would  come  when  the  light  of  his  eye 
would  go  out,  and  the  magnificent  structure  of  his 
mind  would  crumble  to  its  foundations  and  become 
as  that  which  had  never  been,  but  no  work  from 
his  hand,  no,  not  a  line,  would  he  leave  to  tell  the 
tale  of  what  had  been  lost  in  him.  His  genius  should 
not  be  crowned  with  thorns  by  the  world's  mis- 
juds:ment,  neither  should  it  wear  the  defiling  pur- 
ple cloak  of  the  world's  admiration.  He  exulted  at 
the  thought  that  generation  after  generation  would 
be  born  and  die,  and  the  greatest  men  of  all  ages 
would  spend  years  of  their  life  in  the  attempt  to 
gain  what  he  could  have  given  them  if  he  had  chosen 
to  open  his  hand. 

The  fact  that  he  lived  in  such  a  humble  fashion 
gave  him  a  curious  pleasure,  simplv  because  there 
was  such  a  magnificent  extravagance  in  using  his 
mind  to  teach  children,  such  a  wild  incongruity  in 
paying  for  his  time  with  mere  daily  bread,  and  such 
a  colossal  absurdity  in  allowing^  him  to  earn  this 
bread  upon  the  recommendation  of  poor,  ordinary 
mortals,  who  had  vouched  for  him  that  he  knew 
enou8[h  to  take  upon  himself  the  miserable  task  of 
a  tutor.  xAnd  they  had  given  him  no7i  in  his  exam- 
ination for  a  decree ! 

Oh,  there  was  rapture  in  feeling  the  brutal  stu- 
pidity of  an  existence  that  cast  him  aside  as  poor 
chaff  and  valued  as  grolden  grain  the  empty  husks, 


28  NIELS  LYHNE 

while  he  knew  in  his  own  mind  that  his  lightest 
thought  was  worth  a  world! 

Yet  there  were  other  times  when  the  solitude  of 
his  greatness  weighed  upon  him  and  depressed  him. 

Ah,  how  often,  when  he  had  communed  with 
himself  in  sacred  silence,  hour  after  hour,  and  then 
returned  again  to  consciousness  of  the  audible,  vis- 
ible life  round  about  him,  had  he  not  felt  himself 
a  stranger  to  its  paltriness  and  corruptibility.  Then 
he  had  often  been  like  the  monk  who  listened  in  the 
monastery  woods  to  a  single  trill  of  the  paradise 
bird  and,  when  he  came  back,  found  that  a  century 
had  died.  Ah,  if  the  monk  was  lonely  with  the  gen- 
eration that  lived  among  the  groves  he  knew,  how 
much  more  lonely  was  the  man  whose  contempo- 
raries had  not  yet  been  born. 

In  such  desolate  moments  he  would  sometimes 
be  seized  with  a  cowardly  longing  to  sink  down  to 
the  level  of  the  common  herd,  to  share  their  low- 
born happiness,  to  become  a  native  of  their  great 
earth  and  a  citizen  of  their  little  heaven.  But  soon 
he  would  be  himself  again. 

The  other  newcomer  was  Edele  Lyhne,  Lyhne's 
twenty-six-year-old  sister.  She  hadlived  many  years 
in  Copenhagen,  first  with  her  mother,  who  had 
moved  to  the  city  when  she  became  a  widow,  and, 
after  her  mother's  death,  in  the  home  of  a  wealthy 
uncle.  Councillor  of  State  Neergaard.  The  Neer- 
gaards  entertained  on  a  large  scale  and  went  out  a 


CHAPTER  III  29 

great  deal,  so  Edele  lived  in  a  whirl  of  balls  and 
festivities. 

She  was  admired  wherever  she  went,  and  envy, 
the  faithful  shadow  of  admiration,  also  followed 
her.  She  was  talked  about  as  much  as  one  can  be 
without  having  done  anything  scandalous,  and 
whenever  men  discussed  the  three  reigning  beauties 
of  the  town  there  were  always  many  voices  in  favor 
of  striking  out  one  name  and  substituting  that  of 
Edele  Lyhne,  but  they  could  never  agree  on  which 
of  two  others  should  yield  to  her — as  for  the  third, 
it  was  out  of  the  question. 

Yet  very  young  men  did  not  admire  her.  They 
were  abashed  in  her  presence,  and  felt  twice  as 
stupid  as  usual  when  she  listened  to  them  with  her 
look  of  mild  toleration  —  a  maliciously  emphasized 
toleration  which  crushed  them  with  a  sense  that 
she  had  heard  it  all  before  and  knew  it  by  heart. 
They  made  efforts  to  shine  in  her  eyes  and  their 
own  by  assuming  biases  airs,  by  inventing  wild  para- 
doxes, or,  when  their  desperation  reached  a  climax, 
by  making  bold  declarations;  but  all  these  at- 
tempts, jostling  and  crowding  one  upon  the  other 
in  the  abrupt  transitions  of  youth,  were  met  with 
the  faint  shadow  of  a  smile,  a  deadly  smile  of  bore- 
dom, which  made  the  victim  redden  and  feel  that  he 
was  the  one  hundred  and  eleventh  fly  in  the  same 
merciless  spider's  web. 

Moreover,  her  beauty  had  neither  the  softness 


30  NIELS  LYHNE 

nor  the  fire  to  ensnare  young  hearts.  On  older 
hearts  and  cooler  heads  she  exercised  a  peculiar  fas- 
cination. 

She  was  tall.  Her  thick,  heavy  hair  was  blonde 
with  the  faint  reddish  sheen  of  ripening  wheat,  but 
fairer  and  curling  where  it  grew  in  two  points  low 
on  the  nape  of  her  neck.  Under  the  high,  clean- 
cut  forehead,  her  eyebrows  were  pale  and  indefi- 
nite. The  light  gray  eyes  were  large  and  clear,  nei- 
ther accented  by  the  brows  nor  borrowing  fitful 
shadows  from  the  thin,  delicate  lids.  There  was 
something  indeterminate  and  indeterminable  in 
their  expression.  They  always  met  you  with  a  full 
and  open  gaze,  without  any  of  the  changeful  play 
of  sidelong  glances  or  lightning  flashes,  but  almost 
unnaturally  wakeful,  invincible,  inscrutable.  The 
vivacity  was  all  in  the  lower  part  of  the  face,  the 
nostrils,  the  mouth,  and  the  chin.  The  eyes  merely 
looked  on.  The  mouth  was  particularly  expressive. 
The  lips  met  in  a  lovely  bow  with  deep,  gracious 
curves  and  flexible  lines,  but  their  beauty  was  a 
little  marred  by  a  hardness  of  the  lower  lip,  which 
sometimes  melted  away  in  a  smile,  and  then  again 
stiff^ened  into  something  akin  to  brutality. 

The  bold  sweep  of  the  back  and  the  luxuriant 
fullness  of  the  bosom,  contrasted  with  the  classic 
severity  of  the  shoulders  and  arms,  gave  her  an 
audacity,  an  exotic  fascination,  which  was  enhanced 
by  the  gleaming  whiteness  of  her  skin  and  the  mor- 


CHAPTER  III  31 

bid  redness  of  her  lips.  The  effect  was  provocative 
and  disquieting. 

Her  tall,  slender  figure  had  a  subtle  distinction, 
which  she  was  clever  enough  to  underscore,  espe- 
cially in  her  ball  dresses,  with  sure  and  conscious 
art.  In  fact,  her  artistic  sense  applied  to  her  own 
person  would  sometimes  speak  so  loudly  from  her 
costume  that  it  barely  escaped  a  hint  of  bad  taste 
even  when  most  exquisitely  tasteful.  To  many  this 
seemed  an  added  charm. 

Nothing  could  be  more  punctiliously  correct 
than  her  behavior.  In  what  she  said,  and  in  what  she 
permitted  to  be  said,  she  kept  within  the  strictest 
bounds  of  prudery.  Her  coquetry  consisted  in  not 
being  coquettish,  in  being  incurably  blind  to  her 
own  power,  and  never  making  the  slightest  distinc- 
tion between  her  admirers.  For  that  very  reason, 
they  all  dreamed  intoxicating  dreams  of  the  face  that 
must  be  hidden  behind  the  mask;  they  believed 
in  a  fire  under  the  snow  and  scented  depravity  in 
her  innocence.  None  of  them  would  have  been  sur- 
prised to  hear  that  she  had  a  secret  lover,  but  neither 
would  they  have  ventured  to  guess  his  name. 

This  was  the  way  people  saw  Edele  Lyhne. 

She  had  left  the  city  for  Lonborggaard,  because 
her  health  had  suffered  from  the  constant  round  of 
pleasures,  the  thousand  and  one  nights  of  balls  and 
masquerades.  Toward  the  end  of  the  winter,  the 
doctor  had  declared  her  lungs  to  be  affected,  and 


32  NIELS  LYHNE 

had  prescribed  fresh  air,  quiet,  and  milk.  All  these 
things  she  found  in  abundance  in  her  present 
abode,  but  she  also  found  an  unceasing  boredom, 
which  made  her  long  for  Copenhagen  before  a  week 
had  passed.  She  filled  letter  after  letter  with  en- 
treaties that  she  might  be  allowed  to  return  from 
her  exile,  and  hinted  that  homesickness  did  her 
more  harm  than  the  air  did  her  good.  But  the  doc- 
tor had  so  alarmed  her  uncle  and  aunt  that  they 
felt  it  their  duty  to  turn  a  deaf  ear  to  her  lamenta- 
tions, no  matter  how  pathetic. 

It  was  not  so  much  the  social  diversions  she 
pined  for;  it  was  rather  that  she  craved  the  sense  of 
feeling  her  own  life  mingling  with  the  sound-filled 
air  of  the  great  city,  whereas  in  the  country  the  still- 
ness in  thoughts,  in  words,  in  eyes  —  in  everything 
—  made  her  feel  as  though  she  heard  herself  un- 
ceasingly and  with  inescapable  distinctness,  just  as 
one  hears  a  watch  ticking  through  a  sleepless  night. 
And  to  know  that  over  there  they  were  living  ex- 
actly as  before — it  was  as  if  she  were  lying  dead  in 
the  quiet  night  and  heard  the  strains  of  music  from 
a  ballroom  stealing  on  the  air  over  her  grave. 

There  was  no  one  she  could  talk  to.  No  one 
of  them  all  ever  caught  just  the  shade  of  meaning 
that  was  the  essence  of  what  she  said.  Of  course, 
they. understood  her  after  a  fashion,  inasmuch  as 
she  spoke  Danish,  but  it  was  in  a  dull,  general  sort 
of  a  way,  just  as  they  might  have  understood  a 


CHAPTER  III  33 

foreign  language  which  they  heard  only  once  in  a 
while.  They  never  had  the  slightest  idea  of  whom 
or  what  was  meant  by  a  particular  intonation  of  a 
word,  never  dreamed  that  such  a  little  phrase  was 
a  quotation,  or  that  another,  used  in  just  such  a 
way,  was  a  new  variation  of  a  popular  witticism. 
As  for  their  own  speech,  it  had  a  decent  leanness 
through  which  one  could  positively  feel  the  gram- 
matical ribs,  and  the  words  were  used  with  a  literal- 
ness  as  if  they  had  just  come  fresh  from  the  col- 
umns of  the  dictionary.  Even  the  way  they  said 
Copenhagen!  Sometimes  with  a  mysterious  empha- 
sis, as  if  it  were  a  place  where  people  ate  little  chil- 
dren; then  again  with  a  far-away  expression,  as  if 
they  were  speaking  of  a  town  in  central  Africa,  or 
in  a  festive  voice  tremulous  with  history,  as  they 
might  have  said  Nineveh  or  Carthage.  The  pastor 
always  said  Axelstead  with  a  reminiscent  rapture, 
as  if  it  had  been  the  name  of  one  of  his  old  sweet- 
hearts. Not  one  of  them  could  say  Copenhagen  so 
that  it  meant  the  city  stretching  from  Vesterport 
to  the  Custom  House  on  both  sides  of  Ostergade 
and  Kongens  Nytorv.  And  so  it  was  with  all  they 
said  and  all  they  did. 

There  was  not  a  thing  at  Lonborggaard  that  did 
not  displease  her;  these  mealtimes  regulated  by  the 
sun,  this  smell  of  lavender  in  chests  and  presses, 
these  Spartan  chairs,  all  these  provincial  pieces  of 
furniture  that  stood  shrinking  against  the  walls  as 


34  NIELS  LYHNE 

if  they  were  afraid  of  people !  Even  the  very  air  was 
distasteful  to  her;  she  could  never  take  a  walk  with- 
out bringing  home  a  robust  perfume  of  meadow- 
hay  and  wild  flowers,  as  if  she  had  been  locked  up 
in  a  haymarket. 

And  then  to  be  called  aunt.  Aunt  Edele.  How  it 
grated  on  her  ears!  She  got  used  to  it  after  a  while, 
but  in  the  beginning  it  made  the  relation  between 
her  and  Niels  rather  cool. 

Niels  did  n't  care. 

Then  came  a  Sunday  in  the  early  part  of  August, 
when  Lyhne  and  his  wife  had  gone  out  in  the  car- 
riage to  pay  a  visit,  and  Niels  and  Miss  Edele  were 
home  alone.  In  the  morning  Edele  had  asked  Niels 
to  pick  some  corn-flowers  for  her,  but  he  had  for- 
gotten it.  Suddenly,  in  the  afternoon,  as  he  was 
walking  with  Frithjof,  he  remembered,  gathered  a 
bouquet,  and  ran  up  to  the  house  with  it. 

Everything  was  so  still  that  he  imagined  his  aunt 
must  be  asleep,  and  crept  silently  through  the 
house.  At  the  threshold  of  the  sitting-room  he 
stopped,  with  bated  breath,  preparing  to  approach 
Edele's  door.  The  sitting-room  was  flooded  with 
sunshine,  and  a  blossoming  oleander  made  the 
air  heavy  with  its  sweet  fragrance.  There  was  no 
sound  except  a  muffled  splash  from  the  flower- 
stand  whenever  the  goldfish  moved  in  their  glass 
dish. 

Niels  crossed  the  room,  balancing  himself  with 


CHAPTER  III  35 

outstretched  arms,  his  tongue  between  his  teeth. 
Cautiously  he  grasped  the  door-knob,  which  was 
so  hot  with  the  sun  that  it  burned  his  hand,  and 
turned  it  slowly  and  carefully,  knitting  his  brows  and 
half  closing  his  eyes.  He  pulled  the  door  toward 
him,  bent  in  through  the  narrow  opening,  and  laid 
the  flowers  on  a  chair  just  within.  The  room  was 
dark  as  if  the  shades  were  down,  and  the  air  seemed 
moist  with  fragrance,  the  fragrance  of  attar  of  roses. 
As  he  stooped,  he  saw  only  the  light  straw  matting 
on  the  floor,  the  wainscoting  under  the  window, 
and  the  lacquered  foot  of  a  Gueridon ;  but  when 
he  straightened  himself  to  back  out  of  the  door, 
he  caught  sight  of  his  aunt. 

She  was  stretched  full-length  on  a  couch  of  sea- 
green  satin,  dressed  in  a  fanciful  gypsy  costume. 
As  she  lay  on  her  back,  chin  up,  throat  tense,  and 
forehead  low,  her  loosened  hair  flowed  down  over 
the  end  of  the  couch  and  along  the  rug.  An  arti- 
ficial pomegranate  flower  looked  as  if  it  had  been 
washed  ashore  on  an  island  made  by  a  little  bronze- 
colored  shoe  in  the  midst  of  the  dull  golden  stream. 

The  motley  colors  of  her  dress  were  rich  and 
mellow.  Dull  blue,  pale  rose,  gray,  and  orange  were 
blended  in  the  pattern  of  a  little  low-cut  bodice  of 
a  thick,  lustreless  stuflF.  Underneath,  she  wore  a 
white  silk  chemise  with  wide  sleeves  falling  to  the 
elbow.  The  white  had  a  faint  pinkish  tone,  and  was 
shot  with  threads  of  reddish  gold.  Her  skirt  of 


36  NIELS  LYHNE 

pansy-colored  velvet  without  any  border  was  gath- 
ered loosely  around  her,  and  slid  down  over  the  side 
of  the  couch  in  slanting  folds.  Her  feet  and  legs 
were  bare,  and  around  her  crossed  ankles  she  had 
wound  a  necklace  of  pale  corals.  An  open  fan  was 
lying  on  the  floor,  showing  its  pattern  of  playing- 
cards  arranged  in  a  wheel,  and  a  little  farther  away  a 
pair  of  leaf-brown  silk  stockings  had  been  thrown, 
one  partly  rolled  up,  the  other  spread  out  and 
revealing  the  red  clock. 

At  the  same  moment  that  Niels  caught  sight  of 
her,  she  saw  him.  Involuntarily  she  made  a  slight 
movement  as  if  to  rise,  but  checked  herself  and  lay 
still  as  before,  only  turning  her  head  a  little  to  look 
at  the  boy  with  a  questioning  smile. 

"  I  brought  these,"  he  said,  and  went  over  to  her 
with  the  flowers. 

She  held  out  her  hand, glanced  at  them  and  then 
at  her  costume,  comparing  the  colors,  and  dropped 
them  with  a  wearily  murmured  "Impossible!'* 

Niels  would  have  picked  them  up,  but  she 
stopped  him  with  a  motion  of  her  hand. 

"Give  me  that!"  she  said,  pointing  to  a  red  flask 
that  lay  on  a  crumpled  handkerchief  at  her  feet. 

Niels  went  to  take  it.  His  face  was  crimson,  as 
he  bent  over  the  milkwhite,  gently  rounded  legs 
and  the  long,  slender  feet,  which  had  almost  the  in- 
telligence of  a  hand  in  their  fine  flexible  curves.  He 
felt  dizzy,  and  when  one  foot  suddenly  turned  and 


CHAPTER  III  37 

bent  downward  with  a  quick  movement,  he  almost 
fell. 

"Where  did  you  pick  the  flowers? "  Edele  asked. 

Niels  pulled  himself  together  and  turned  toward 
her.  "I  picked  them  in  the  pastor's  rye-field,"  he 
said,  in  a  voice  that  sounded  strange  to  himself.  He 
handed  her  the  flask  without  looking  up. 

Edele  noticed  his  emotion  and  looked  at  him 
astonished.  Suddenly  she  blushed,  raised  herself  on 
one  arm,  and  drew  her  feet  under  her  petticoat.  "Go, 
go,  go,  go ! "  she  said,  half  peevishly,  half  shyly, and 
at  every  word  she  sprayed  him  with  the  attar  of 
roses. 

Niels  went.  When  he  was  out  of  the  room,  she 
let  her  feet  glide  slowly  down  from  the  couch  and 
looked  at  them  curiously. 

Running  with  unsteady  steps,  he  hurried  through 
the  house  to  his  own  room.  He  felt  quite  stunned; 
there  was  a  strange  weakness  in  his  knees  and  a 
choking  sensation  in  his  throat.  He  threw  himself 
down  on  the  couch  and  closed  his  eyes,  but  it  was 
of  no  avail,  a  strahge  restlessness  possessed  him; 
his  breath  came  heavily  as  in  fear,  and  the  light 
tortured  him  in  spite  of  his  closed  eyelids. 

Little  by  little  a  change  came  over  him.  A  hot, 
heavy  breath  seemed  to  blow  on  him  and  make  him 
helplessly  weak.  He  felt  as  one  in  a  dream  who  hears 
some  one  calling  and  tries  to  go,  but  cannot  move 
a  foot,  and  is  tortured  by  his  weakness,  sickens  with 


38  NIELS  LYHNE 

his  longing  to  get  away,  is  lashed  to  madness  by  this 
calling  which  does  not  know  one  is  bound.  And  he 
sighed  impatiently  as  if  he  were  ill  and  looked 
around  quite  lost.  Never  had  he  felt  so  miserable, 
so  lonely,  so  forsaken,  and  so  forlorn. 

He  sat  down  in  the  flood  of  sunlight  from  the 
window,  and  wept. 

From  that  day  Niels  felt  a  timid  happiness  in 
Edele's  presence.  She  was  no  more  a  human  being 
like  any  one  else,  but  an  exalted  creature,  divine 
by  virtue  of  her  strange,  mystic  beauty.  His  heart 
throbbed  with  rapture  in  merely  looking  at  her, 
kneeling  to  her  in  his  heart,  crawling  to  her  feet 
in  abject  self-effacement.  Yet  there  were  moments 
when  his  adoration  had  to  have  vent  in  outward 
signs  of  subjection.  At  such  times  he  would  lie  in 
wait  for  a  chance  to  steal  into  Edele's  room  and  go 
through  a  fixed  rite  of  a  certain  interminable  num- 
ber of  kisses  lavished  on  the  little  rug  in  front  of 
her  bed,  her  shoe,  or  any  other  object  that  presented 
itself  to  his  idolatry. 

He  regarded  it  as  a  piece  of  great  good  fortune 
that  his  Sunday  jacket  happened  to  be  degraded, 
just  then,  to  every-day  use;  for  the  lingering  scent 
of  attar  of  roses  was  like  a  mighty  talisman  with 
which  he  could  conjure  up  in  a  magic  mirror  the 
image  of  Edele  as  he  had  seen  her  lying  on  the 
green  couch  wearing  her  masquerade  costume.  In 
the  story  he  and  Frithjof  were  telling  each  other, 


CHAPTER  III  39 

this  image  was  ever  present,  and  from  now  on  the 
wretched  Frithjof  was  never  safe  from  bare-footed 
princesses.  If  he  dragged  himself  through  the  dense 
primeval  forest,  they  would  call  to  him  from  ham- 
mocks of  vines.  If  he  sought  shelter  from  the  storm 
in  a  mountain  cave,  they  would  rise  from  their 
couches  of  velvety  moss  to  welcome  him,  and  when 
he  dashed,  bloody  and  smoke-blackened,  into  the 
pirate's  cabin,  shivering  the  door  with  a  tremendous 
blow  of  his  sabre,  he  found  them  there  too,  rest- 
ing on  the  captain's  green  sofa.  They  bored  him 
terribly,  and  he  could  not  see  why  they  should 
suddenly  have  become  so  necessary  to  their  be- 
loved heroes. 


No  matter  in  how  exalted  a  place  a  human  being 
may  set  his  throne,  no  matter  how  firmly  he  may 
press  the  tiara  of  the  exceptional,  that  is  genius, 
upon  his  brow,  he  can  never  be  sure  that  he  may 
not,  like  Nebuchadnezzar,  be  seized  with  a  sud- 
den desire  to  go  on  all-fours  and  eat  grass  and  herd 
with  the  common  beasts  of  the  field. 

That  was  what  happened  to  Mr.  Bigum  when 
he  quite  simply  fell  in  love  with  Miss  Edele,  and 
it  availed  him  nothing  that  he  distorted  history  to 
find  an  excuse  for  his  love  by  calling  Edele  Bea- 
trice or  Laura  or  Vittoria  Colonna,  for  all  the  ar- 
tificial halos  with  which  he  tried  to  crown  his  love 


40  NIELS  LYHNE 

were  blown  out  as  fast  as  he  could  light  them  by 
the  stubborn  fact  that  it  was  Edele's  beauty  he  was 
in  love  with;  nor  was  it  the  graces  of  her  mind  and 
heart  that  had  captivated  him,  but  her  elegance,  her 
air  of  fashion,  her  easy  assurance,  even  her  grace- 
ful insolence.  It  was  a  kind  of  love  that  might  well 
fill  him  with  shamed  surprise  at  the  inconstancy 
of  the  children  of  men. 

And  what  did  it  all  matter !  Those  eternal  truths 
and  makeshift  lies  that  were  woven  ring  in  ring  to 
iform  the  heavy  armor  he  called  his  principles,  what 
were  they  against  his  love?  If  they  really  were  the 
strength  and  marrow  and  kernel  of  life,  then  let 
them  show  their  strength ;  if  they  were  weaker,  let 
them  break;  if  stronger — But  they  were  already 
broken,  plucked  to  pieces  like  the  mesh  of  rotten 
threads  they  were.  What  did  she  care  about  eter- 
nal truths?  And  the  mighty  visions,  how  did  they 
help  him?  Thoughts  that  plumbed  the  unfathoma- 
ble, could  they  win  her?  All  that  he  possessed  was 
worthless.  Even  though  his  soul  shone  with  the  ra- 
diance of  a  hundred  suns,  what  did  it  avail,  when  his 
light  was  hidden  under  the  ugly  fustian  of  a  Dioge- 
nes' mantle?  Oh,  for  beauty!  Take  my  soul  and  give 
me  my  thirty  pieces  of  silver  —  Alcibiades'  body, 
Don  Juan's  mantle,and  a  court  chamberlain's  rank  ! 

But,  alas,  he  had  none  of  these  graces,  and  Edele 
was  by  no  means  attracted  to  his  heavy,  philosophic 
nature.  His  habit  of  seeing  life  in  barbarously  naked 


CHAPTER  III  41 

abstractions  gave  him  a  noisy  dogmaticism,  an  un- 
pleasant positiveness  that  jarred  her  like  a  mis- 
placed drum  in  a  concert  of  soft  music.  The  strained 
quality  of  his  mind,  which  always  seemed  to  knit 
its  muscles  and  strike  an  attitude  before  every  little 
question  like  a  strong  man  about  to  play  with  iron 
balls,  seemed  to  her  ridiculous.  He  irritated  her  by 
his  censorious  morality,  which  pounced  on  every 
lightly  sketched  feeling,  indiscreetly  tearing  away 
its  incognito,  rudely  calling  it  by  name,  just  as  it 
was  about  to  flit  past  him  in  the  course  of  conver- 
sation. 

Bigum  knew  very  well  what  an  unfavorable  im- 
pression he  made  and  how  hopeless  his  love  was, 
but  he  knew  it  as  we  know  a  thing  when  we  hope 
with  all  the  strength  of  our  soul  that  our  knowledge 
is  false.  There  is  always  the  miracle  left;  and  though 
miracles  do  not  happen,  they  might  happen.  Who 
knows?  Perhaps  our  intelligence,  our  instinct,  our 
senses,  in  spite  of  their  daylight  clearness,  are  lead- 
ing us  astray.  Perhaps  the  one  thing  needful  is  just 
that  unreasoning  courage  which  follows  hope's  will- 
o'-the-wisp  as  it  burns  over  seething  passions  preg- 
nant with  desire !  It  is  only  when  we  have  heard  the 
door  of  destiny  slam  shut  that  we  begin  to  feel  the 
iron-cold  talons  of  certainty  digging  into  our  breast, 
gathering  slowly,  slowly  around  our  heart,  and 
fastening  their  clutches  upon  the  fine  thread  of  hope 
on  which  our  world  of  happiness  hangs:  then  the 


42  NIELS  LYHNE 

thread  is  severed;  then  all  that  it  held  falls  and  is 
shattered ;  then  the  shriek  of  despair  sounds  through 
the  emptiness. 

In  doubt,  no  one  despairs. 

On  a  sunny  afternoon  in  September,  Edele  was 
sitting  on  the  landing  of  the  half-dozen  broad,  old- 
fashioned  steps  that  led  down  from  the  summer 
parlor  into  the  garden.  Behind  her,  the  French  win- 
dows were  wide  open,  flung  back  against  the  mot- 
ley wall-covering  of  bright  red  and  bright  green 
vines.  She  leaned  her  head  against  a  chair  piled  high 
with  large  black  portfolios,  and  held  an  etching  up 
before  her  with  both  hands.  Color  prints  of  By- 
zantine mozaics  in  blue  and  gold  were  scattered  on 
the  pale  green  rush  matting  that  covered  the  boards 
of  the  landing,  on  the  threshold,  and  on  the  oak- 
brown  parquet  floor  of  the  summer  parlor.  At  the 
foot  of  the  steps  lay  a  white  shade  hat;  for  Edele*s 
hair  was  uncovered,  with  no  ornament  but  a  flower 
of  gold  filigree  in  a  pattern  to  match  the  gold  brace- 
let she  wore  high  on  her  arm.  Her  white  dress  was 
of  semi-transparent  stuff  with  narrow  silky  stripes; 
it  had  an  edging  of  twisted  orange  and  black  che- 
nille and  tiny  rosettes  in  the  same  two  colors.  Light 
silk  mitts  covered  her  hands  and  reached  to  the 
elbow.  They  were  pearl  gray  like  her  shoes. 

The  yellow  sunlight  was  filtered  through  the 
drooping  branches  of  an  ancient  ash.  It  pierced  the 


CHAPTER  III  43 

cool  dimness,  forming  distinct  lines  of  light,  pow- 
dering the  air  with  gold  dust,  and  painting  the  steps, 
the  wall,  and  the  doors  with  spots  of  light,  spot 
of  sun  upon  spot  of  sun,  like  a  perforated  shade. 
Through  the  tracery  of  shadow,  each  color  rose  to 
meet  the  light:  white  from  Edele's  dress,  blood- 
red  from  crimson  lips,  amber  from  yellow-blonde 
hair,  and  a  hundred  other  tints  round  about,  blue 
and  gold,  oak-brown,  glitter  of  glass,  red  and  green. 

Edele  dropped  the  etching  and  looked  up  de- 
spondently, her  eyes  expressing  the  silent  plaint 
she  was  too  weary  to  give  vent  to  in  a  sigh.  Then 
she  settled  down  again  as  if  to  shut  out  her  sur- 
roundings and  withdraw  within  herself. 

Just  then  Mr.  Bigum,  appeared. 

Edele  looked  at  him  with  a  drowsy  blinking  like 
that  of  a  child  who  is  too  sleepy  and  comfortable  to 
stir,  but  too  curious  to  shut  its  eyes. 

Mr.  Bigum  wore  his  new  beaver  hat.  He  was  ab- 
sorbed in  his  own  thoughts,  and  gesticulated  with 
his  tombac  watch  in  his  hand,  until  the  thin  silver 
chain  threatened  to  snap.  With  a  sudden,  almost 
vicious  movement,  he  thrust  the  watch  deep  down 
into  his  pocket,  threw  back  his  head  impatiently, 
caught  the  lapel  of  his  coat  in  a  peevish  grasp,  and 
would  have  gone  on  with  an  angry  jerk  of  his  whole 
body,  his  face  darkened  by  all  the  hopeless  rage  that 
boils  in  a  man  when  he  is  running  away  from  his  own 
torturing  thoughts,  and  knows  that  he  runs  in  vain. 


44  NIELS  LYHNE 

Edele's  hat,  lying  at  the  foot  of  the  steps  and 
shining  white  against  the  black  earth  of  the  walk, 
stopped  him  in  his  flight.  He  picked  it  up  with  both 
hands,  then  caught  sight  of  Edele,  and  as  he  stood 
trying  to  think  of  something  to  say,  he  held  it  in- 
stead of  giving  it  to  her.  Not  an  idea  could  he  find  in 
his  brain;  not  a  word  would  be  born  on  his  tongue, 
and  he  looked  straight  ahead  with  a  stupid  expres- 
sion of  arrested  profundity. 

"It  is  a  hat,  Mr.  Bigum,"  said  Edele  carelessly, 
to  break  the  embarrassed  silence. 

"Yes,"  said  the  tutor  eagerly,  delighted  to  hear 
her  confirm  a  likeness  that  had  struck  him  also ;  but 
the  next  moment  he  blushed  at  his  clumsy  answer. 

"It  was  lying  here," he  added  hurriedly,  "here 
on  the  ground  like  this — just  like  this,"  and  he 
bent  down  to  show  where  it  had  lain  with  an  incon- 
sequential minuteness  born  of  his  confusion.  He 
felt  almost  happy  in  his  relief  at  having  given  some 
sign  of  life,  however  futile.  He  was  still  standing 
with  the  hat  in  his  hand. 

"Do  you  intend  to  keep  it?"  asked  Edele. 

Bigum  had  no  answer  to  that. 

"I  mean  will  you  give  it  to  me.^"  she  explained. 

Bigum  came  a  few  steps  nearer  and  handed  her 
the  hat.  "  Miss  Ly hne,"  he  said, "  you  think  —  you 
must  not  think  —  I  beg  you  to  let  me  speak;  that  is 
—  I  am  not  saying  anything,  but  be  patient  with 
me!  —  I  love  you.  Miss  Lyhne,  unutterably,  un- 


CHAPTER  III  45 

utterably,  beyond  all  words  I  love  you.  Oh,  if  lan- 
guage held  a  word  that  combined  the  cringing  ad- 
miration of  the  slave,  the  ecstatic  smile  of  the  martyr, 
and  the  gnawing  homesickness  of  the  exile,  with 
that  word  I  could  tell  you  my  love.  Oh,  listen  to  me, 
do  not  thrust  me  away  yet!  Do  not  think  that  I 
am  insulting  you  with  an  insane  hope!  I  know  how 
insignificant  I  seem  in  your  eyes,  how  clumsy  and 
repulsive,  yes,  repulsive.  I  am  not  forgetting  that 
I  am  poor, — you  must  know  it,  —  so  poor  that  I 
have  to  let  my  mother  live  in  a  charitable  institu- 
tion, and  I  can't  help  it,  can't  help  it.  I  am  so  miser- 
ably poor.  Yes,  Miss  Lyhne,  I  am  only  a  poor  ser- 
vant in  your  brother's  house,  and  yet  there  is  a  world 
where  I  am  ruler,  powerful,  proud,  rich,  with  the 
crown  of  victory,  noble  by  virtue  of  the  passion  that 
drove  Prometheus  to  steal  the  fire  from  the  heaven 
of  the  gods.  There  I  am  brother  to  all  the  great  in 
spirit,  whom  the  earth  has  borne,  and  who  bear  the 
earth.  I  understand  them  as  none  but  equals  under- 
stand one  another;  no  flight  that  they  have  flown 
is  too  high  for  the  strength  of  my  wings.  Do  you 
understand  me?  Do  you  believe  me?  Oh,  don't  be- 
lieve me !  It  is  n't  true,  I  am  nothing  but  the  Kobold 
figure  you  see  before  you.  It  is  all  past;  for  this 
terrible  madness  of  love  has  paralyzed  my  wings, 
the  eyes  of  my  spirit  have  lost  their  sight,  my  heart 
is  dried  up,  my  soul  is  drained  to  bloodless  pol- 
troonery. Oh,  save  me  from  myself,  Miss  Lyhne, 


46  NIELS  LYHNE 

don't  turn  away  in  scorn !  Weep  over  me,  weep,  it 
is  Rome  burning!" 

He  had  fallen  to  his  knees  on  the  steps,  wring- 
ing his  hands.  His  face  was  blanched  and  distorted, 
his  teeth  were  clinched  in  agony,  his  eyes  drowned 
in  tears;  his  whole  body  shook  under  the  suppressed 
sobs  that  were  heard  only  as  a  gasping  for  breath. 

"Control  yourself,  Mr.  Bigum,"  she  said  in  a 
slightly  too  compassionate  tone.  "Control  your- 
self; don't  give  way  so,  be  a  man !  Please  get  up  and 
go  down  into  the  garden  a  little  while  and  try  to  pull 
yourself  together." 

"And  you  can't  love  me  at  all?  "  groaned  Mr. 
Bigum  almost  inaudibly.  "Oh,  it 's  terrible!  There 
is  not  a  thing  in  my  soul  that  I  would  n't  murder 
and  degrade  if  I  could  win  you  thereby.  No,  no, 
even  if  any  one  offered  me  madness  and  I  could 
possess  you  in  my  hallucinations, /J^i'j^i'^  you,  then 
I  would  say :  Take  my  brain,  tear  down  its  wonder- 
ful structure  with  rude  hands,  break  all  the  fine 
threads  that  bind  my  spirit  to  the  resplendent  tri- 
umphal chariot  of  the  human  mind,  and  let  me  sink 
in  the  mire  of  the  physical,  under  the  wheels  of 
the  chariot,  and  let  others  follow  the  shining  paths 
that  lead  to  the  light!  Do  you  understand  me  ^  Can 
you  comprehend  that  even  if  your  love  came  to  me 
robbed  of  its  glory,  debased,  befouled,  as  a  cari- 
cature of  love,  as  a  diseased  phantom,  I  would  re- 
ceive it  kneeling  as  if  it  were  the  Sacred  Host?  But 


CHAPTER  III  47 

the  best  in  me  is  useless,  the  worst  in  me  is  useless, 
too.  I  cry  to  the  sun,  but  it  does  not  shine;  to  the 
statue,  but  it  does  not  answer- — answer!  .  .  .  What 
is  there  to  answer  except  that  I  suffer?  No,  these 
unutterable  torments  that  rend  my  whole  being 
down  to  its  deepest  roots,  this  anguish  is  nothing 
to  you  but  an  impertinence.  You  feel  nothing  but 
a  little  cold  offence;  in  your  heart  you  laugh  scorn- 
fully at  the  poor  tutor  and  his  impossible  passion." 
"You  do  me  an  injustice,  Mr.  Bigum,"  said 
Edele,  rising,  while  Mr.  Bigum  rose  too.  "  I  am  not 
laughing.  You  ask  me  if  there  is  no  hope,  and  I 
answer:  No,  there  is  no  hope.  That  is  surely  noth- 
ing to  laugh  at.  But  there  is  one  thing  I  want  to 
say  to  you.  From  the  first  moment  you  began  to 
think  of  me,  you  must  have  known  what  my  answer 
would  be,  and  you  did  know  it,  did  you  notP 
You  knew  it  all  the  time,  and  yet  you  have  been 
lashing  all  your  thoughts  and  desires  on  toward 
the  goal  which  you  knew  you  could  not  reach.  I 
am  not  offended  by  your  love,  Mr.  Bigum,  but  I 
condemn  it.  You  have  done  what  so  many  people 
do:  they  close  their  eyes  to  the  realities  and  stop 
their  ears  when  life  cries  ^  No '  to  their  wishes.  They 
want  to  forget  the  deep  chasm  fate  has  placed  be- 
tween them  and  the  object  of  their  ardent  long- 
ing. They  want  their  dream  to  be  fulfilled.  But 
life  takes  no  account  of  dreams.  There  is  n't  a  single 
obstacle  that  can  be  dreamed  out  of  the  world,  and 


48  NIELS  LYHNE 

In  the  end  we  lie  there  crying  at  the  edge  of  the 
chasm,  which  hasn't  changed  and  is  just  where  it 
always  was.  But  we  have  changed,  for  we  have  let 
our  dreams  goad  all  our  thoughts  and  spur  all  our 
longings  to  the  very  highest  tension.  The  chasm 
is  no  narrower,  and  everything  in  us  cries  out  with 
longing  to  reach  the  other  side,  but  no,  always  no, 
never  anything  else.  If  we  had  only  kept  a  watch 
on  ourselves  in  time!  But  now  it  is  too  late,  now 
we  are  unhappy.'* 

She  paused  almost  as  if  she  woke  from  a  trance. 
Her  voice  had  been  quiet,  groping,  as  if  she  were 
speaking  to  herself,  but  now  it  hardened  into  a  cold 
aloofness. 

"I  cannot  help  you,  Mr.  Bigum.  You  are  noth- 
ing to  me  of  what  you  wish  to  be.  If  that  makes 
you  unhappy,  you  must  be  unhappy;  if  you  suffer, 
you  must  suffer  —  there  are  always  some  who  have 
to  suffer.  If  you  make  a  human  being  your  God 
and  the  ruler  of  your  fate,  you  must  bow  to  the 
will  of  your  divinity,  but  it  is  never  wise  to  make 
yourself  gods,  or  to  give  your  soul  over  to  another; 
for  there  are  gods  who  will  not  step  down  from  their 
pedestals.  Be  sensible,  Mr.  Bigum!  Your  god  is  so 
small  and  so  little  worth  your  worship ;  turn  from  it 
and  be  happy  with  one  of  the  daughters  of  the  land." 

With  a  faint  little  smile,  she  went  in  through  the 
summer  parlor,  while  Mr.  Bigum  looked  after  her, 
crestfallen.  For  another  fifteen  minutes  he  walked 


CHAPTER  III  49 

up  and  down  before  the  steps.  All  the  words  that  had 
been  spoken  seemed  to  be  still  vibrating  through 
the  air;  she  had  so  lately  gone,  it  seemed  that  her 
shadow  must  still  linger  there;  it  seemed  that  she 
could  not  yet  be  out  of  reach  of  his  prayers,  and 
everything  could  not  be  inexorably  ended.  But  after 
a  while  the  chambermaid  came  out  and  gathered 
up  the  engravings,  carried  in  the  chair,  the  portfo- 
lios, the  rush  matting — everything. 

Then  he  could  go  too. 

In  the  open  gable  window  up  above,  Niels  sat 
gazing  after  him.  He  had  heard  the  whole  conver- 
sation from  beginning  to  end.  His  face  had  a  fright- 
ened look,  and  a  nervous  trembling  passed  through 
his  body.  For  the  first  time  he  was  afraid  of  life. 
For  the  first  time  his  mind  grasped  the  fact  that 
when  life  has  sentenced  vou  to  suffer,  the  sentence 
is  neither  a  fancy  nor  a  threat,  but  you  are  dragged 
to  the  rack,  and  you  are  tortured,  and  there  is  no 
marvellous  rescue  at  the  last  moment,  no  awaken- 
ing as  from  a  bad  dream. 

He  felt  it  as  a  foreboding  which  struck  him  with 
terror. 


Edele  did  not  have  a  good  autumn,  and  the  win- 
ter drained  her  strength  completely.  Spring,  when 
it  came,  did  not  find  one  poor  little  life-germ  that 
it  could  warm  and  coax  into  growth;  it  found  only 


50  NIELS  LYHNE 

a  withering,  which  no  gentleness  and  no  warmth 
could  arrest  or  even  retard.  But  it  could  at  least 
pour  a  flood  of  light  over  the  paling  life  and  caress 
the  ebbing  strength  with  fragrant,  balmy  air,  as  the 
evening  crimson  follows  slowly  in  the  wake  of  dying 
day. 

The  end  came  in  May,  on  a  day  flooded  with  sun- 
shine, one  of  the  days  when  the  lark  is  never  silent, 
and  you  can  almost  see  the  rye  grow.  The  great 
cherry-trees  outside  of  her  window  were  white  with 
flowers  —  nosegays  of  snow,  wreaths  of  snow,  cupo- 
las, arches,  garlands,  a  fairy  architecture  against  the 
bluest  of  skies. 

She  was  very  weak  that  day,  and  withal  she  felt 
a  strange  sense  of  lightness.  She  knew  what  was 
coming,  for  that  morning  she  had  sent  for  Bigum 
and  said  good-by  to  him. 

Her  uncle  had  come  over  from  Copenhagen, 
and  all  that  afternoon  the  handsome,  white-haired 
man  sat  by  her  bedside  with  his  hand  folded  in  her 
hands.  He  did  not  speak,  but  once  in  a  while  he 
would  move  his  hand,  and  she  would  press  it;  she 
would  look  up,  and  he  would  smile  to  her.  Her 
brother,  too,  was  in  the  room,  gave  her  medicine, 
and  helped  her  in  other  ways. 

She  lay  very  still  with  closed  eyes,  while  famil- 
iar pictures  from  life  over  there  flitted  past  her. 
Sorgenfri  with  hanging  birches,  the  red  church  at 
Lyngby  standing  on  a  foundation  of  graves,  and 


CHAPTER  III  51 

the  white  country  house  with  the  bit  of  sunken  road 
leading  down  to  the  sea,  where  the  paling  always 
was  green  as  if  painted  by  the  water,  —  the  images 
took  shape  before  her,  grew  clear,  melted  away, 
and  vanished.  And  other  pictures  came.  There  was 
Bredgade  when  the  sun  went  down,  and  the  dark- 
ness closed  in  around  the  houses.  There  was  the 
queer  Copenhagen  you  found  when  you  came  in 
from  the  country  in  the  forenoon.  It  seemed  so 
weird  with  its  hurry  and  bustle  in  the  sunlight, 
with  the  whitened  window-panes  and  the  streets 
smelling  of  fruit.  There  was  something  unreal 
about  the  houses  in  the  strong  light;  the  noise  and 
rattle  of  wheels  could  not  chase  away  the  silence 
that  seemed  to  enfold  them.  .  .  .  Then  came  the 
dim,  quiet  drawing-room  in  the  autumn  evenings, 
when  she  was  dressed  for  the  theatre,  and  the  others 
were  not  down  yet — the  smell  of  incense,  the  wood 
fire  from  the  stove  lighting  up  the  carpet — the  rain 
whipping  the  windows — the  horses  stamping  at  the 
door — the  melancholy  cry  of  the  mussel-venders 
.  .  .  and  back  of  all  this  the  theatre  awaiting  her 
with  light  and  music  and  festive  glow. 

With  such  pictures  the  afternoon  wore  away. 

Niels  and  his  mother  were  in  the  parlor.  Niels 
knelt  by  the  sofa  with  his  face  pressed  down  against 
its  brown  velvet  and  his  hands  clasped  over  his 
head.  He  wept  and  wailed  aloud,  giving  himself  up 
to  his  grief  without  any  attempt  at  self-control. 


52  NIELS  LYHNE 

Mrs.  Lyhne  sat  beside  him.  The  hymn-book  lay 
on  the  table  in  front  of  her,  open  at  the  hymns  usu- 
ally sung  at  funerals.  Now  and  then  she  read  a  few 
verses,  and  sometimes  she  would  bend  down  over 
her  son  to  speak  a  word  of  soothing  or  chiding,  but 
Niels  would  not  be  comforted,  and  she  could  not 
stop  his  weeping  or  the  wild  prayers  born  of  his 
despair. 

Presently  Lyhne  appeared  in  the  door  of  the 
sick-room.  He  made  no  sign,  but  looked  at  them 
so  solemnly  that  both  rose  and  followed  him  in  to 
his  sister.  He  took  them  by  the  hand  and  led  them 
to  the  bed.  Edele  looked  up  and  gazed  at  each  one 
in  turn,  while  her  lips  motioned  for  words.  Then 
Lyhne  took  his  wife  over  to  the  window  and  sat 
down  there  with  her.  Niels  threw  himself  on  his 
knees  at  the  foot  of  the  bed. 

He  wept  softly  and  prayed  with  clasped  hands, 
eagerly  and  incessantly,  in  a  low,  passionate  whis- 
per. He  told  God  that  he  would  not  stop  hoping. 
"  I  won*t  let  You  go.  Lord,  I  won't  let  You  go  be- 
fore You  have  said  'Yes'!  You  mustn't  take  her 
away  from  us ;  for  You  know  how  we  love  her — You 
mustn't,  You  mustn't!  Oh,  I  can't  say,  'Thy  will 
be  done;'  for  Your  will  is  to  let  her  die,  but,  oh,  let 
her  live!  I  will  thank  You  and  obey  You.  I  will  do 
everything  I  know  You  want  me  to  do.  I  '11  be  so 
good  and  never  offend  You,  if  You  will  only  let  her 
live !  Do  You  hear,  God?  Oh,  stop,  stop,  and  make 


CHAPTER  III  53 

her  well  before  it's  too  late!  I  will,  I  will, oh,  what 
can  I  promise  You?  —  Oh,  I  '11  thank  You,  never, 
never,  forget  You ;  oh,  but  hear  me !  Don't  You  see 
she's  dying,  don't  You  see  she's  dying?  Do  You 
hear?  Take  Your  hand  away!  I  can't  lose  her,  God, 
I  can't !  Let  her  live,  won't  You  please,  won't  You 
please?  Oh,  it's  wicked  of  You — " 

Outside,  beyond  the  window,  the  white  flowers 
flushed  to  pink  in  the  light  of  the  setting  sun.  Arch 
upon  arch,  the  blossoming  sprays  built  of  their  gos- 
samer bloom  a  rose-castle,  a  vaulted  choir  of  roses, 
and  through  this  airy  dome  the  azure  sky  shone 
with  a  softened  twilight  blue,  while  golden  lights 
and  lights  of  gold  flaming  to  crimson  shot  like  the 
rays  of  a  nimbus  from  every  garlanded  line  of  the 
ethereal  temple. 

White  and  still,  Edele  lay  there  with  the  old 
man's  hand  between  both  of  hers.  Slowly  she 
breathed  out  her  life,  breath  by  breath;  fainter  and 
fainter  was  the  rising  of  her  breast;  heavier  and 
heavier  fell  the  eyelids. 

"My  love  to  Copenhagen!"  was  her  last  low 
whisper. 

But  her  last  message  was  heard  by  no  one.  It  did 
not  come  from  her  lips  even  as  a  breath  —  her  mes- 
sage to  him,  the  great  artist  whom  she  had  loved 
secretly  with  her  whole  soul,  but  to  whom  she  had 
been  nothing,  only  a  name  that  his  ear  knew,  only 
one  unrecognized  figure  in  the  great  admiring  public. 


54  NIELS  LYHNE 

The  light  faded  into  blue  dusk,  and  her  hands 
fell  weakly  apart.  The  shadows  grew — shadows  of 
night  and  of  death. 

The  old  man  bent  down  over  her  bed  and  laid 
his  hands  on  her  pulse,  waiting  quietly,  and  when 
the  last  throb  of  life  had  ebbed  away,  when  the  last 
feeble  pulse-beat  was  stilled,  he  lifted  the  pale  hand 
to  his  lips. 

"Little  Edele!" 


Chapter  IV 

THERE  are  those  who  can  take  up  their  grief 
and  bear  it,  strong  natures  who  feel  their  own 
powers  through  the  very  heaviness  of  their  burden. 
Weaker  people  give  themselves  up  to  their  sor- 
row passively,  as  they  would  submit  to  a  sickness; 
and  like  a  sickness  their  sorrow  pervades  them, 
drinks  itself  into  their  innermost  being  and  becomes 
a  part  of  them,  is  assimilated  in  them  through  a 
slow  struggle,  and  finally  loses  itself  in  them,  as  they 
return  to  perfect  health. 

But  there  are  yet  others  to  whom  sorrow  is  a  vio- 
lence done  them,  a  cruelty  which  they  never  learn 
/  to  accept  as  a  trial  or  chastisement  or  as  simple  fate. 
It  is  to  them  an  act  of  tyranny,  an  expression  of 
personal  hate,  and  it  always  leaves  a  sting  in  their  | 
hearts. 

Children  do  not  often  grieve  in  this  way,  but 
Niels  Lyhne  did.  For  had  he  not  been  face  to  face 
with  God  in  the  fervor  of  his  prayers?  Had  he  not 
crawled  on  his  knees  to  the  foot  of  the  throne,  full 
of  hope,  tremulous  with  fear,  and  yet  firm  in  his 
faith  in  the  omnipotence  of  prayer,  with  courage  to 
plead  until  he  should  be  heard?  And  he  had  been 
forced  to  rise  from  the  dust  and  go  away  with  his 
hope  put  to  shame.  His  faith  had  not  been  able  to 
bring  the  miracle  down  from  heaven,  no  God  had 
answered  his  cry,  death  had  marched  straight  on  and 


56  NIELS  LYHNE 

seized  its  firey,  as  if  no  sheltering  wall  of  prayers 
had  been  lifted  toward  the  sky. 

A  stillness  fell  upon  him.  His  faith  had  flung 
itself  blindly  against  the  gates  of  heaven,  and  now 
it  lay  on  Edele's  grave  with  broken  wings.  For  he 
had  believed  with  the  crude,  implicit  fairy-tale  faith 
that  children  so  often  feel.  The  complex,  subtly 
shaded  figure  of  the  Catechism  is  not  the  God  chil- 
dren believe  in;  their  God  is  the  mighty  one  in 
the  Old  Testament,  He  who  loved  Adam  and  Eve 
so  much,  and  to  whom  the  whole  generation  of 
men,  kings,  prophets,  Pharaohs,  are  nothing  but 
good  and  bad  children,  this  tremendous,  fatherly 
God,  Who  is  wrathful  with  the  anger  of  a  giant 
and  bountiful  with  the  generosity  of  a  giant,  Who 
has  hardly  created  life  before  He  lets  death  loose 
upon  it.  Who  drowns  His  earth  in  the  waters  from 
His  heaven,  who  thunders  down  laws  too  heavy 
for  the  race  He  made,  and  who,  finally,  in  the 
days  of  the  Emperor  Augustus,  has  pity  upon 
men  and  sends  His  Son  to  death  in  order  that 
the  law  may  be  broken  while  it  is  fulfilled.  This 
God,  Who  always  answers  with  a  miracle,  is  the 
one  to  whom  children  speak  when  they  pray.  By 
and  by,  a  day  comes  when  they  understand  that 
they  have  heard  His  voice  for  the  last  time  in  the 
earthquake  that  shook  Golgotha  and  opened  the 
graves,  and  that  now,  since  the  veil  of  His  Holy 
of  Holies  has  been  rent  in  twain,  it  is  the  God 


CHAPTER  IV  57 

Jesus  who  reigns ;  and  from  that  day  on  they  pray 
differently. 

But  Niels  had  not  yet  attained  to  this.  It  is  true, 
he  had  followed  Jesus  on  His  earthly  pilgrimage 
with  a  believing  heart,  but  when  he  saw  Him  sub- 
jecting Himself  to  the  Father,  going  about  so  be- 
reft of  power  and  suffering  so  humanly,  all  this  had 
hidden  the  godhead  from  him.  He  had  seen  in 
Him  only  the  one  Who  did  the  will  of  the  Father, 
the  Son  of  God,  not  God  Himself:  therefore,  it 
was  to  God  the  Father  he  had  prayed,  and  it  was 
God  the  Father  who  had  failed  him  in  his  bitter 
need.  But  if  God  had  turned  from  him,  he  could 
turn  from  God.  If  God  had  no  ears,  he  had  no 
lips;  if  God  had  no  compassion,  he  had  no  worship, 
and  he  defied  and  cast  God  out  of  his  heart. 

On  the  day  Edele  was  buried,  he  spurned  the 
earth  of  the  grave  with  his  foot,  whenever  the  pas- 
tor spoke  the  name  of  the  Lord,  and  when  he  met 
it  afterwards  in  books  or  on  the  lips  of  people,  a 
rebellious  frown  would  wrinkle  his  youthful  fore- 
head. When  he  lay  down  to  sleep  at  night,  a  sense 
of  forsaken  greatness  came  over  him,  as  he  thought 
that  now  all  the  others,  children  and  grown  people, 
were  praying  to  the  Lord  and  closing  their  eyes 
in  His  name,  while  he  alone  held  his  hands  from 
clasping  in  prayer,  he  alone  refused  to  do  God 
homage.  He  was  shut  out  from  the  sheltering  care 
of  Heaven.  No  angel  watched  by  his  side;  alone  and 


K 


58  NIELS  LYHNE 

unprotected,  he  drifted  on  the  strangely  murmur- 
ing waters  of  darkness,  and  loneliness  enfolded  him, 
spreading  out  from  his  bed  in  ever  widening  and 
\  receding  circles.  Still  he  did  not  pray;  though  he 
I  longed  till  tears  came,  he  did  not  call. 

And  it  was  so  all  his  life.  He  had  freed  himself 
(  defiantly  from  the  point  of  view  imposed  upon  him 
j  by  his  teachers,  and  he  fled  with  his  sympathy  to  the 
side  of  those  who  had  wasted  their  strength  in  vainly 
kicking  against  the  pricks.  In  the  books  he  had  been 
given  to  read  and  in  what  he  had  been  taught,  God 
and  His  chosen  people  and  ideas  marched  on  in  an 
endless  triumphal  procession,  and  he  hadjoined  in 
the  jubilant  shouting,  had  exulted  in  the  sense  of  be- 
ing counted  with  the  proud  legions  of  the  conqueror ; 
for  is  not  victory  always  righteous,  and  is  not  the 
victor  a  liberator,  a  reformer,  a  light  bringer? 

But  now  the  shouting  had  died  down.  Now  he 
was  silent,  and  he  began  to  enter  into  the  thoughts 
of  the  defeated  and  feel  with  the  hearts  of  the  van- 
quished. He  understood  that  even  when  that  which 
prevails  is  good,  that  which  yields  is  not  therefore 
bad.  He  went  over  to  the  losing  side  and  told  him- 
self that  this  was  finer  and  greater.  The  power  of 
the  victor  he  called  mere  brute  force  and  violence. 
He  took  sides  —  as  whole-heartedly  as  he  could — 
against  God,  but  as  a  vassal  who  takes  up  arms 
against  his  liege  lord;  for  he  still  believed,  and  could 
not  drive  out  his  faith  by  defiance. 


CHAPTER  IV  59 

His  tutor,  Mr.  Bigum,  was  not  one  who  could 
lead  a  soul  back  to  the  old  paths.  Indeed,  his  tem- 
peramental philosophy,  by  virtue  of  which  he  could 
be  fired  and  enraptured  by  each  and  every  side  of 
the  question  —  to-day,  one;  to-morrow,  another — 
set  all  dogmas  adrift  in  the  minds  of  his  pupils. 
At  bottom  he  was  really  a  man  of  Christian  prin- 
ciples, and  if  any  one  could  have  pinned  him  down 
to  saying  what  was  the  fixed  point  in  all  this  fluid 
matter,  he  would  most  likely  have  replied  that  it 
was  the  creed  of  the  Evangelical  Lutheran  Church 
or  something  akin  to  that,  but  he  himself  had  very 
little  inclination  to  drive  his  pupils  along  the  straight 
road  of  orthodoxy  or  to  warn  them  at  every  step 
that  the  least  deviation  from  the  beaten  track  meant 
straying  into  lies  and  darkness,  likely  to  end  in 
perdition  and  hell;  for  he  had  none  of  the  passion- 
ate concern  of  the  orthodox  for  jots  and  tittles.  He 
was,  in  fact,  religious  in  the  slightly  artistic,  supe- 
rior manner  such  talented  people  affect,  not  afraid 
of  a  little  harmonizing,  easily  enticed  into  half  un- 
conscious rearrangements  and  adaptations,  because, 
whatever  they  do,  they  must  assert  their  own  per- 
sonality, and,  in  whatever  spheres  they  fly,  must 
hear  the  whirring  of  their  own  wings. 

Such  people  do  not  guide,  but  their  instruction 
has  a  fullness,  a  copiousness,  and  a  wobbly  many- 
sidedness  which,  provided  they  do  not  utterly  con- 
fuse a  pupil,  tend  to  develop  his  independence  in 


6o  NIELS  LYHNE 

a  high  degree,  since  they  almost  force  him  to  make 
up  his  mind  for  himself.  For  children  can  never 
rest  upon  anything  vague  or  indefinite;  their  very 
instinct  of  self-preservation  demands  a  plain  Yes 
or  a  plain  No,  a  for  or  against,  to  show  them  where 
to  turn  with  their  hate  and  where  with  their  love. 

Hence  there  was  no  firm  and  immutable  au- 
thority that  might  have  guided  Niels  with  its  con- 
stant clinching  of  arguments  and  pointing  of  ways. 
He  had  taken  the  bit  in  his  teeth,  and  plunged 
headlong  on  any  path  that  opened  before  him, 
provided  only  that  it  led  him  away  from  what 
had  been  the  home  of  his  feelings  and  of  his 
thoughts. 

He  felt  a  new  sense  of  power  in  thus  seeing  with 
his  own  eyes  and  choosing  with  his  own  heart  and 
forming  himself  by  his  own  will.  Many  new  things 
came  to  his  mind;  traits  of  his  own  nature  that  he 
had  never  thought  of  and  that  seemed  unrelated 
one  to  the  other,  fitted  themselves  together  won- 
derfully and  were  fused  into  a  rational  whole.  It 
was  a  fascinating  time  of  discovery.  Little  by  little, 
in  fear  and  uncertain  exultation,  in  incredulous  joy, 
he  found  himself.  He  began  to  realize  that  he  was 
not  like  others,  and  a  new  spiritual  modesty  made 
him  shy,  awkward,  and  taciturn.  He  grew  suspi- 
cious of  questions,  and  imagined  he  found  hints  of 
his  own  most  hidden  thoughts  in  everything  that 
was  said.  Having  learned  to  read  in  his  own  heart. 


CHAPTER  IV  6i 

he  supposed  everybody  else  could  read  what  was 
written  there,  and  he  shunned  his  elders,  preferring 
to  roam  about  alone.  It  seemed  to  him  that  people 
had  suddenly  become  very  intrusive;  he  developed 
a  slightly  hostile  feeling  toward  them  as  to  crea- 
tures of  another  race,  and  in  his  loneliness  he  be- 
gan to  hold  them  up  for  scrutiny  and  judgment. 
Formerly  the  names  of  father,  mother,  the  pastor, 
the  miller,  sufficed  to  characterize,  and  the  name 
had  quite  hidden  the  person  from  him.  But  now 
he  saw  that  the  pastor  was  a  jolly  little  man,  who 
made  himself  as  meek  and  demure  as  he  could  at 
home  to  escape  the  notice  of  his  wife,  while  abroad 
he  tried  to  forget  the  domestic  yoke  by  talking 
himself  into  a  frenzy  of  rebellion  and  loud-voiced 
thirst  for  liberty.  That  was  the  pastor  as  he  saw 
him  now. 

And  Mr.  Bigum? 

He  had  seen  him  ready  to  throw  everything  over- 
board for  Edele's  love,  had  heard  him  deny  him- 
self and  the  soul  within  him  in  that  hour  of  pas- 
sion in  the  garden,  and  now  he  was  always  talking 
about  the  philosopher  risingin  Olympic  calm  above 
the  vague  whirlwinds  and  mist-born  rainbows  of 
life.  It  roused  a  painful  contempt  in  the  lad  and 
made  his  doubts  sleep  but  lightly,  ready  to  wake  in 
a  moment.  For  how  could  he  know  that  the  very 
things  in  human  nature  which  Mr.  Bigum  called 
by  belittling  names  were  otherwise  christened  when 


62  NIELS  LYHNE 

they  appeared  in  himself,  and  that  his  Olympic 
calm  toward  that  which  moves  common  mortals 
was  but  a  Titan's  disdainful  smile,  quick  with  mem- 
ories of  a  Titan's  longing  and  a  Titan's  passions. 


Chapter  V 

SIX  months  had  passed  since  Edele's  death,  when 
one  of  Lyhne's  cousins,  Mrs.  Refstrup,  be- 
came a  widow.  Her  husband  had  been  a  potter, 
but  the  business  had  never  been  flourishing,  and 
during  his  long  illness  it  had  quite  run  to  seed,  so 
there  was  scarcely  anything  between  the  widow  and 
actual  want.  Seven  children  were  more  than  she 
could  provide  for.  The  two  youngest  and  also  the 
oldest,  who  could  help  her  in  the  factory,  remained 
with  her,  but  the  others  were  distributed  among 
the  family.  The  Lyhnes  took  the  second  boy,  Erik, 
who  was  fourteen,  and  had  been  studying  at  the 
Latin  school  in  the  nearest  town,  where  he  had  free 
tuition.  Now  he  was  to  share  Mr.  Bigum's  instruc- 
tion with  Niels  and  Frithjof  Petersen,  the  pastor's 
boy. 

It  was  very  much  against  his  will  that  he  was 
kept  at  his  books,  for  he  wanted  to  be  a  sculptor. 
His  father  had  called  this  nonsense,  but  Lyhne 
had  nothing  against  it;  he  said  the  boy  had  talent. 
Still  he  thought  he  ought  to  take  his  bachelor's 
degree  first,  in  order  to  have  something  to  fall  back 
upon;  and  besides  a  classical  education  was  neces- 
sary to  a  sculptor,  or  was,  at  least,  very  desirable. 
That  settled  the  matter  for  the  time  being.  Erik 
had  to  console  himself  with  the  fairly  large  collec- 
tion of  good  engravings  and  neat  bronzes  that  Lon- 


64  NIELS  LYHNE 

borggaard  had  to  offer.  This  meant  a  great  deal 
to  jne  who  had  seen  nothing  but  the  rubbish  be- 
queathed the  local  library  by  a  bone-carver  more 
freakish  than  artistic  in  taste,  and  Erik  was  soon  busy 
with  pencil  and  modelling-stick.  No  one  attracted 
him  as  did  Guido  Reni,  who  in  those  days  was 
more  famous  than  Raphael  and  the  greatest ;  nor 
is  there  anything  that  can  open  young  eyes  to  the 
beauty  of  a  work  of  art  better  than  the  certainty  that 
their  admiration  is  authorized  up  to  the  highest  pin- 
nacle. Andrea  del  Sarto,  Parmigianino,  and  Luini, 
who  were  to  mean  so  much  to  him  later  when  he  and 
his  talent  had  found  each  other,  left  him  quite  in- 
different, while  the  boldness  of  Tintoretto  and  the 
bitterness  of  Salvator  Rosa  and  Caravaggio  filled 
him  with  delight.  For  sweetness  in  art  has  no 
appeal  for  the  very  young;  the  daintiest  of  minia- 
ture painters  begins  his  career  in  the  footsteps  of 
Buonarotti,  and  the  pleasantest  of  lyrists  sets  out 
on  his  first  voyage  under  the  black  sail  of  bloody 
tragedy. 

Still  Erik's  art  was  to  him  only  a  game,  only  a 
little  better  than  other  games,  and  he  was  no  more 
proud  of  a  well-modelled  head  or  a  cleverly  carved 
horse  than  of  hitting  the  weather  vane  on  the  church 
steeple  with  a  stone,  or  of  swimming  out  to  Sonder- 
hagen  and  back  again  without  resting.  These  were 
the  games  in  which  he  excelled,  games  requiring 
physical  prowess,  strength,  endurance,  a  sure  hand, 


CHAPTER  V  65 

and  a  practised  eye.  He  cared  nothing  for  the 
kind  of  sport  Niels  and  Frithjof  liked,  where  fancy 
plays  the  leading  role,  and  all  the  events  and  tri- 
umphs are  imagined.  The  result  was  that  the  other 
two  soon  left  their  old  pastime  to  follow  Erik's  lead. 
Their  romance  books  were  laid  aside,  and  the  inter- 
minable story  came  to  a  rather  violent  end  one  day 
at  a  secret  session  in  the  hayloft.  Silence  brooded 
over  its  newly  filled  grave.  In  fact,  they  shrank 
from  mentioning  it  to  Erik,  for  he  had  not  been 
with  them  many  days  before  they  suspected  that 
he  would  make  fun  of  them  and  their  story,  that 
he  would  shame  them  and  lower  them  in  their  own 
eyes.  He  had  the  power  to  do  this  because  he  him- 
self was  so  free  from  all  day-dreams  and  fancies  and 
enthusiasms.  His  clear,  boyish  common  sense  was 
as  merciless  in  its  perfect  healthfulness  and  as  con- 
temptuous of  mental  idiosyncrasies  as  children  gen- 
erally are  of  physical  blemishes.  For  that  reason 
Niels  and  Frithjof  were  afraid  of  him.  They  formed^ 
themselves  after  him,  denied  much  and  concealed 
more.  Niels  was  especially  quick  to  suppress  in 
himself  anything  that  was  not  of  Erik's  world,  and 
with  the  burning  zeal  of  the  renegade,  he  scoffed  at 
Frithjof,  whose  slower,  more  faithful  nature  could 
not  instantly  throw  over  the  old  for  the  new.  His 
unkind  mockery  really  sprang  from  jealousy,  for 
he  had  fallen  in  love  with  Erik  on  the  very  first 
day,  while  the  latter,  in  shy  aloofness,  half  reluc- 


/ 


66  NIELS  LYHNE 

tant,  half  supercilious,  just  barely  and  grudgingly 
allowed  himself  to  be  loved. 

Among  all  the  emotional  relations  of  life  is  there 
any  that  is  finer,  more  sensitive,  and  more  fervent 
than  the  exquisitely  modest  love  of  one  boy  for 
another  boy?  It  is  a  love  that  never  speaks  and 
never  dares  to  vent  itself  in  a  caress  or  a  look,  a 
seeing  love  that  grieves  bitterly  over  every  fault 
in  the  loved  one,  a  love  made  up  of  longing  and 
admiration  and  self-forgetfulness,  of  pride  and  hu- 
mility and  calmly  breathing  happiness. 

Erik  stayed  at  Lonborggaard  only  a  little  over 
a  year.  It  happened  that  Lyhne,  on  a  visit  to  Co- 
penhagen, took  occasion  to  speak  about  the  boy  to 
one  of  the  leading  sculptors  there,  and  showed  him 
some  of  Erik's  sketches,  whereupon  Mikkelsen, 
the  sculptor,  declared  that  this  was  talent,  and 
further  studying  was  a  waste  of  time.  It  did  not 
require  much  classical  education  to  find  a  Greek 
name  for  a  nude  figure.  So  it  was  settled  that  Erik 
was  to  be  sent  at  once  to  the  city  to  attend  the 
Academy  and  work  in  Mikkelsen's  studio. 

On  the  last  afternoon,  Niels  and  Erik  were  sit- 
ting in  their  room,  Niels  looking  at  the  pictures  in 
a  penny  magazine,  Erik  deep  in  Spengler's  criti- 
cal catalogue  of  the  art  collection  at  Christiansborg. 
How  often  he  had  turned  the  leaves  of  this  book 
and  tried  to  form  a  conception  of  the  pictures  from 
its  naive  description !  Sometimes  he  would  get  al- 


CHAPTER  V  67 

most  sick  with  longing  to  behold  all  this  art  and 
beauty  with  his  own  eyes,  to  grasp  it  in  very  truth 
and  make  that  glory  of  line  and  color  his  own  by  the 
mere  strength  of  his  enthusiasm.  And  how  often, 
too,  he  had  closed  the  book,  weary  of  gazing  into 
that  drifting,  fantastic  mist  of  words  which  refused 
to  solidify  and  take  shape,  refused  to  give  forth 
anything,  but  went  on  in  a  vague  and  confused 
shifting — flowing  and  slipping  away  —  flowing  and 
slipping  away. 

But  to-day  it  was  all  different.  Now  he  had  the 
certainty  that  the  shapes  he  read  about  would  not 
be  shadows  from  dreamland  much  longer,  and  he 
felt  rich  in  the  promise  of  the  book.  The  pictures 
rose  before  him  as  never  before,  flashing  out  like 
brilliant,  many-colored  suns  from  a  mist  that  was 
golden  and  dancing  wdth  gold. 

"What  are  you  looking  at?"  he  asked  Niels. 

Niels  pointed  to  a  portrait  in  his  book  repre- 
senting Lassen,  the  hero  of  the  Second  of  April. 
How  ugly  he  is!"  commented  Erik. 
Ugly!  Why,  he  was  a  hero — would  you  call 
him  ugly,  too?"  Niels  turned  the  leaves  back  to 
the  picture  of  a  great  poet. 

"Awfully  ugly!"  replied  Erik  decisively,  mak- 
ing a  grimace.  "What  a  nose!  And  look  at  the 
mouth,  and  the  eyes,  and  those  tufts  around  his 
head !" 

Then  Niels  saw  that  he  was  ugly,  and  he  was 


68  NIELS  LYHNE 

silenced.  It  had  never  occurred  to  him  that  great- 
ness was  not  always  cast  in  a  mould  of  beauty. 

"  While  I  think  of  it,"  said  Erik,  closing  his 
Spengler,  "let  me  give  you  the  key  to  the  deck- 
house.'* 

Niels  would  have  brushed  him  aside  gloomily, 
but  Erik  hung  a  small  padlock  key  around  his 
friend's  neck  on  a  broad  piece  of  ribbon.  "Shall  we 
go  down  there?"  he  asked. 

They  went.  Frithjof  they  found  by  the  garden 
fence.  He  lay  there  eating  green  gooseberries,  and 
had  tears  in  his  eyes  because  of  the  parting.  Be- 
sides he  was  hurt  that  the  others  had  not  looked 
him  up ;  for  though  he  generally  came  uninvited,  he 
felt  that  such  a  day  demanded  a  certain  amount  of 
formality.  Without  speaking,  he  held  out  a  hand- 
ful of  berries  to  them,  but  they  had  had  their  fa- 
vorite dishes  for  dinner,  and  turned  up  their  noses. 

"Sour!"  said  Erik  with  a  shudder. 

"Indigestible  truck! "added  Niels,  disdainfully 
looking  down  at  the  proffered  berries.  "  How  can 
you  eat  it?  Chuck  the  stuff,  we're  going  down  to 
the  deck-house,"  and  he  pointed  with  his  chin  at 
the  key,  for  his  hands  were  in  his  pockets. 

At  that  they  all  three  set  forth. 

The  deck-house  was  an  old  green-painted  ship's 
cabin,  which  had  once  been  bought  at  a  beach  auc- 
tion. It  had  been  put  up  by  the  fjord,  and  had  served 
as  a  tool-house  when  the  dam  was  being  built,  but 


CHAPTER  V  69 

now  it  was  no  longer  in  use.  So  the  boys  had  taken 
possession  of  it,  and  concealed  in  it  their  ships, 
bows  and  arrows,  leaping-poles,  and  other  treasures, 
particularly  such  forbidden  but  indispensable  things 
as  powder,  tobacco,  and  matches. 

Niels  opened  the  door  of  the  deck-house  with 
an  air  of  gloomy  solemnity.  They  went  in  and  fum- 
bled till  they  found  their  things  in  the  dark  cor- 
ners of  the  empty  bunks. 

"  Do  you  know,"  said  Erik,  with  his  head  deep 
in  a  distant  corner,  "  I  'm  going  to  blow  mine  up." 
.'^Mine  and  Frithjof's  too!"  cried  Niels  with  a 
grand,  consecrating  gesture. 

"  Not  mine,  by  Joe ! "  exclaimed  Frithjof;  "then 
what 'd  we  have  to  sail  with  when  Erik's  goneP" 

"What  indeed!"  mocked  Niels,  turning  away 
contemptuously. 

Frithjof  felt  uncomfortable,  but  when  the  others 
had  gone  outside,  he  carefully  moved  his  ship  to  a 
safer  shelter. 

Outside  they  quickly  laid  the  powder  in  the  ships 
imbedded  in  a  nest  of  tarred  oakum,  set  the  sails, 
fixed  the  fuses,  lighted  them,  and  sprang  back.  Run- 
ning along  the  beach,  they  signalled  to  the  crew  on 
board,  loudly  explaining  to  one  another  every  chance 
turn  of  the  ships  as  the  result  of  the  good  captain's 
nautical  skill.  But  the  ships  ran  aground  at  the  point 
without  the  desired  explosion  having  taken  place, 
and  this  gave  Frithjof  an  opportunity  nobly  to  sac- 


JO  NIELS  LYHNE 

rifice  the  wadding  of  his  cap  to  the  manufacture  of 
new  and  better  fuses. 

With  all  sails  set,  the  ships  stood  in  toward  Sjael- 
land  reef;  the  Britisher's  huge  frigates  came  heavily 
lurching  in  a  closed  ring,  while  the  foam  blew  white 
around  the  black  bows,  and  the  cannon  mounted 
at  the  head  filled  the  air  with  their  harsh  clamor. 
Nearer  and  nearer — glowing  with  red  and  blue, 
glittering  with  gold,  the  figure-heads  of  the  Al- 
bion and  the  Conqueror  rose  fathom-high.  Grayish 
masses  of  sails  hid  the  horizon;  the  smoke  rolled 
out  in  great  white  clouds,  and  drifted  as  a  veiling 
mist  low  over  the  sun-bright  glitter  of  the  waves. 
Then  the  deck  of  Erik's  ship  was  splintered  with 
afeeble  little  puff  ;the  oakum  caught  fire,  a  red  blaze 
burstforth,  and  the  nimble  flames  licked  the  shrouds 
and  ran  along  the  spars,  ate  their  way  smouldering 
along  the  bolt-rope,  then  shot  like  long  flashes  of 
lightning  into  the  sails,  while  the  burning  canvas 
shrivelled  up,  broke,  and  flew  in  large  black  flakes 
far  out  to  sea. The  Danebrog  was  still  waving  high  on 
the  slender  top  of  the  tall  schooner-mast,  the  flag- 
staff was  burned  in  two,  the  flag  fluttered  wildly  like 
red  wings  eager  for  battle, —  but  the  flame  caught 
it,  and  the  smoke-blackened  ship  drifted  without 
rudder  or  helmsman,  dead  and  powerless,  the  sport 
of  the  winds  and  breakers.  Niels's  ship  did  not  burn 
so  well;  the  powder  had  caught  fire  and  some  smoke 
came  out,  but  that  was  all,  and  it  was  not  enough. 


CHAPTER  V  71 

"  Hey,  there!  "called  Niels  from  the  point/^sink 
her  !  Point  the  starboard  cannon  down  the  aft  hatch 
and  give  her  a  volley ! "  He  bent  down  and  picked 
up  a  stone,  "  Ready,  fire ! "  and  the  stone  flew  from 
his  hand. 

Erik  and  Frithjof  followed  suit,  and  soon  the 
hull  was  in  splinters.  Then  Erik's  ship  shared  the 
same  fate.  The  wreckage  was  hauled  ashore  to  make 
a  bonfire.  It  was  piled  up  with  dry  seaweed  and 
grass  into  a  burning  heap,  from  which  thick  smoke 
issued,  while  the  crystals  that  hung  on  the  seaweed 
burst  and  crackled  with  the  intense  heat. 

For  a  long  time  the  boys  sat  quietly  around  the 
bonfire,  but  suddenly  Niels,  still  gloomy,  jumped 
up  and  brought  all  his  things  from  the  deck-house, 
broke  them  in  little  bitSj  and  threw  them  into  the 
flames.  Then  Erik  brought  his,  and  Frithjof  also, 
brought  some.  The  flames  of  the  sacrificial  pyre 
leaped  so  high  that  Erik  was  afraid  they  might  be 
seen  from  the  pasture,  and  began  to  smother  them 
with  wet  seaweed,  but  Niels  stood  still,  gazing  sor- 
rowfully after  the  smoke  that  drifted  along  the  beach. 
Frithjof  kept  in  the  background  and  hummed  to 
himself  a  heroic  lay,  which  he  accompanied  secretly, 
now  and  then,  with  a  sweeping,  bard-like  gesture, 
as  if  he  were  playing  on  the  strings  of  an  invisible 
harp. 

At  last  the  fire  died  down,  and  Erik  and  Frithjof 
went  home,  while  Niels  stayed  behind  to  lock  the 


72  NIELS  LYHNE 

deck-house.  That  done,  he  looked  cautiously  after 
the  others,  and  then  threw  key  and  ribbon  far  out 
into  the  fjord.  Erik  happened  to  look  around  at 
that  moment  and  saw  them  fall,  but  he  quickly 
turned  his  head  away,  and  began  to  run  a  race  with 
Frithjof. 

The  next  day  he  left. 

For  a  while  they  missed  him  sorely  and  bitterly, 
for  their  life  had  been  gradually  formed  on  the  sup- 
position that  they  were  three  to  share  it.  Three 
were  company,  variety,  change;  two  were  boredom 
and  nothing  at  all. 

What  in  the  world  could  two  find  to  do? 

Could  two  shoot  at  a  target  or  two  play  ball? 
They  could  play  Friday  and  Robinson  Crusoe,  to 
be  sure,  but  then  who  would  be  the  savages? 

Such  Sundays!  Niels  was  so  weary  of  existence 
that  he  began  first  to  review  and  afterwards,  with 
the  aid  of  Mr.  Bigum's  large  atlas,  to  extend  his 
geographical  knowledge  far  beyond  the  prescribed 
bounds.  Finally,  he  started  to  read  the  whole  Bible 
through  and  to  keep  a  diary.  But  Frithjof,  in  his 
utter  loneliness,  stooped  so  low  as  to  seek  consola- 
tion in  playing  with  his  sisters. 

After  a  while  the  past  became  less  vivid  to  them, 
the  longing  less  keen.  Sometimes  on  a  quiet  even- 
ing, when  the  sun  reddened  the  wall  in  the  lonely 
chamber,  and  the  distant,  monotonous  calling  of 


CHAPTER  V  73 

the  cuckoo  died  down,  making  the  stillness  wider 
and  larger,  the  longing  would  come  creeping  into 
Niels's  mind,  stealing  its  power;  but  it  no  longer 
tortured,  it  was  a  vague  thing  that  lay  lightly  on 
him  and  was  half  sweet  like  a  pain  that  is  passing. 

His  letters  showed  the  same  trend.  In  the  begin- 
ning they  were  full  of  regrets,  questions,  and  wishes 
loosely  strung  together,  but  soon  they  grew  longer, 
dealt  more  with  externals,  narrated,  and  were  written 
throughout  in  a  well-formed  style  that  hid  between 
the  lines  a  certain  conscious  pleasure  in  being  able 
to  write  so  well. 

As  time  passed,  many  things  that  had  not  dared 
to  show  themselves  while  Erik  was  there  began  to\ 
raise  their  heads.  Imagination  strewed  its  brightv 
flowers  through  the  humdrum  calm  of  an  eventless 
life.  A  dream  atmosphere  enveloped  Niels's  mind, 
bringing  with  it  the  provocative  fragrance  of  life, 
and,  hidden  in  the  fragrance,  the  insidious  poison 
of  life-thirsting  fancies. 

So  Niels  grows  up,  and  all  the  influences  of  his 
childhood  work  on  the  plastic  clay.  Everything 
helps  to  shape  it;  everything  is  significant,  the  real 
and  the  dreamed,  what  is  known  and  what  is  fore- 
shadowed—  all  add  their  touch,  lightly  but  surely, 
to  that  tracery  of  lines  which  is  destined  to  be  first 
hollowed  out  and  deepened  and  afterwards  flattened 
out  and  smoothed  away. 


Chapter  VI 

MR.  Lyhne — Mrs.  Boye ;  Mr.  Frithjof  Peter- 
sen—Mrs.  Boye." 

It  was  Erik  who  performed  the  introduction,  and 
it  took  place  in  Mikkelsen's  studio,  a  light,  spa- 
cious room  with  a  floor  of  stamped  clay  and  a  ceil- 
ing twenty-five  feet  high.  At  one  end  of  the  room 
two  portals  led  to  the  yard;  at  the  other,  a  series 
of  doors  opened  into  the  smaller  studios  within. 
Everything  was  gray  with  the  dust  of  clay  and  plas- 
ter and  marble.  It  had  made  the  cobweb  threads 
overhead  as  thick  as  twine  and  had  drawn  river 
maps  on  the  large  window-panes.  It  filled  eyes  and 
nose  and  mouth  and  outlined  muscles,  hair,  and 
draperies  on  the  medley  of  casts  that  filled  the  long 
shelves  running  round  the  room  and  made  them 
look  like  a  frieze  from  the  destruction  of  Jerusa- 
lem. Even  the  laurels,  high  trees  planted  in  big  tubs 
in  a  corner  near  one  of  the  portals,  were  powdered 
till  they  became  grayer  than  gray  olives. 

Erik  stood  at  his  modelling  in  the  middle  of  the 
studio  wearing  his  blouse  and  with  a  paper  cap  on 
his  dark,  wavy  hair.  He  had  acquired  a  moustache 
and  looked  quite  manly  beside  his  two  friends,  who 
had  just  taken  their  bachelor's  degree  and,  still  pale 
and  tired  from  their  examinations,  looked  provin- 
cially  proper  with  their  too  new  clothes  and  their 
too  closely  cropped  heads  in  rather  large  caps. 


CHAPTER  VI  75 

At  a  little  distance  from  Erik's  scaffolding,  Mrs. 
Boye  sat  in  a  low  high-backed  chair,  holding  a  richly 
bound  book  in  one  hand  and  a  lump  of  clay  in 
the  other.  She  was  small,  quite  small,  and  slightly 
brunette  in  coloring,  with  clear,  light  brown  eyes. 
Her  skin  had  a  luminous  whiteness,  but  in  the 
shadows  of  the  rounded  cheek  and  throat  it  deep- 
ened to  a  dull  golden  tone  which  went  well  with 
the  burnished  hair  of  a  dusky  hue  changing  to  a 
tawny  blondness  in  the  high  lights. 

She  was  laughing  when  they  came  in,  as  a  child 
laughs  —  a  long,  merry  peal, gleefully  loud,  delight- 
fully free.  Her  eyes,  too,  had  the  artless  gaze  of 
a  child,  and  the  frank  smile  on  her  lips  seemed 
all  the  more  childlike  because  the  shortness  of  her 
upper  lip  left  the  mouth  slightly  open  revealing 
milk-white  teeth. 

But  she  was  no  child. 

Was  she  a  little  and  thirty?  The  fullness  of  the 
chin  did  not  say  "No,"  nor  the  ripe  glow  of  the 
lower  lip.  Her  figure  was  well  rounded  with  firm, 
luxuriant  outlines  accentuated  by  the  dark  blue 
dress,  which  fitted  snugly  as  a  riding-habit  around 
her  waist,  arms,  and  bosom.  A  dull  crimson  silk 
kerchief  lay  in  rich  folds  around  her  neck  and  over 
her  shoulders,  its  ends  tucked  into  the  low  pointed 
neck  of  her  bodice.  Carnations  of  the  same  color 
were  fastened  in  her  hair. 

"  I  am  afraid  we  interrupted  a  pleasant  reading/' 


76  NIELS  LYHNE 

said  Frithjof  with  a  glance  at  the  richly  bound 
book. 

"No,  indeed  —  not  In  the  least.  We  had  been 
quarrelling  for  a  full  hour  about  what  we  read,"  re- 
plied Mrs.  Boye.  "  Mr.  Refstrup  is  a  great  idealist 
in  everything  that  has  to  do  with  art,  while  I  think 
It's  dreadfully  tiresome  —  all  this  about  the  crude 
reality  that  has  to  be  purified  and  clarified  and 
regenerated  and  what  not  until  there  Is  just  pure 
nothingness  left.  Do  me  the  favor  of  looking  at 
that  Bacchante  of  Mikkelsen's  —  the  one  which  deaf 
TrafFelini  over  there  is  cutting  in  marble.  If  I  were 
to  enter  her  in  a  descriptive  catalogue  .  .  .  Good 
heavens!  Number  77.  A  young  lady  in  neglige  is 
standing  thoughtfully  on  both  her  feet  and  doesn't 
know  what  to  do  with  a  bunch  of  grapes.  She  should 
crush  those  grapes  if  I  had  my  way  —  crush  them 
till  the  redjuice  ran  down  her  breast — nowshouldn't 
she?  Don't  you  agree  with  me?"  and  she  caught 
Frithjof  by  the  sleeve,  almost  shaking  him  in  her 
childlike  eagerness. 

"  Yes,"  Frithjof  admitted ;  "  yes,  I  do  think  there 
is  something  lacking — something  of  freshness  — 
of  spontaneity — " 

"It's  simply  naturalness  that's  lacking,  and  good 
heavens!  why  can't  we  be  natural?  Oh,  I  know  per- 
fectly well;  it's  because  we  lack  the  courage.  Neither 
the  artists  nor  the  poets  are  brave  enough  to  own  up 
to  human  nature  as  it  is.  Shakespeare  was,  though." 


CHAPTER  VI  77 

"Well,  you  know,"  came  from  Erik  behind  the 
figure  he  was  modelling,  "  I  never  could  get  along 
very  well  with  Shakespeare.  It  seems  to  me  he  does 
too  much  of  it;  he  whirls  you  round  till  you  don't 
know  where  you  are." 

"I  should  n't  go  so  far  as  to  say  that,"  Frithjof 
demurred ;  "  but  on  the  other  hand,"  he  added  with 
an  indulgent  smile,  "I  cannot  call  the  berserker 
ragings  of  the  great  English  poet  by  the  name  of 
conscious  and  intelligent  artistic  courage." 

"Really?  Gracious,  how  funny  you  are!"  and 
she  laughed  long  and  heartily,  laughed  till  she  was 
tired.  She  had  risen  and  was  strolling  about  the 
studio,  but  suddenly  she  turned,  held  out  her  arms 
toward  Frithjof,  and  cried,  "God  bless  you!"  and 
laughed  again  till  she  was  almost  bent  double. 

Frithjof  was  on  the  verge  of  getting  offended,  but 
it  seemed  too  fussy  to  go  away  angry,  especially  as 
he  knew  himself  to  be  in  the  right,  and  moreover 
the  lady  was  very  pretty.  So  he  stayed  and  began 
to  talk  to  Erik,  all  the  while  trying  for  Mrs.  Boye's 
benefit  to  infuse  a  tone  of  mature  tolerance  into 
his  voice. 

Meanwhile  Mrs.  Boye  was  roaming  about  at  the 
other  end  of  the  studio,  thoughtfully  humming  a 
tune,  which  sometimes  rose  in  a  few  quick,  laugh- 
ing trills,  then  sank  again  into  a  slow,  solemn  re- 
citative. 

A  head  of  the  young  Augustus  was  standing  on 


78  NIELS  LYHNE 

a  large  packing-case.  She  began  to  dust  it.  Then  she 
found  some  clay  and  made  moustaches,  a  pointed 
beard,  and  finally  ear-rings,  which  she  fastened  on  it. 

While  she  was  busy  with  this,  Niels  managed  to 
stroll  in  her  direction  under  cover  of  examining  the 
casts.  She  had  not  glanced  toward  him  once,  but  she 
must  have  sensed  that  he  was  there,  for,  without 
turning,  she  held  out  her  hand  to  him  and  asked 
him  to  bring  Erik's  hat. 

Niels  put  the  hat  into  her  outstretched  hand,  and 
she  set  it  on  the  head  of  Augustus. 

"Good  old  Shakespeareson,"  she  said,  patting 
the  cheek  of  the  travestied  bust,  "stupid  old  fellow 
who  did  n't  know  what  he  was  doing!  Did  he  just 
sit  there  and  daub  ink  till  he  turned  out  a  Hamlet 
head  without  thinking  of  it — did  he?"  She  lifted 
the  hat  from  the  bust  and  passed  her  hand  over  the 
forehead  in  a  motherly  way  as  if  she  would  push 
back  its  hair.  "  Lucky  old  chap,  for  all  that!  More 
than  half  lucky  old  poet  boy!  —  For  you  must 
admit  that  he  was  n't  at  all  bad  as  a  writer,  this 
Shakespeare  .f* " 

"I  confess  I  have  my  own  opinion  of  that  man," 
replied  Niels,  shghtly  vexed  and  blushmg. 

"Good  gracious!  Have  you  too  got  your  own 
opinion  about  Shakespeare?  Then  what  is  your 
opinion?  Are  you  for  us  or  against  us?"  She  struck 
an  attitude  by  the  side  of  the  bust  and  stood  there, 
smiling,  with  her  arm  resting  on  its  neck. 


CHAPTER  VI  79 

"I  am  unable  to  say  whether  the  opinion  which 
you  are  astonished  to  learn  I  possess  is  so  fortunate 
as  to  acquire  significance  from  the  fact  of  agree- 
ing with  your  own,  but  I  do  think  I  may  say  that  it 
\sfor  you  and  your  protege.  At  any  rate  I  hold  the 
opinion  that  he  knew  what  he  was  doing,  weighed 
what  he  was  doing,  and  dared  it.  Many  a  time  he 
dared  in  doubt,  and  the  doubt  is  still  apparent.  At 
other  times  he  only  half  dared,  and  then  he  blurred 
over  with  new  features  that  which  he  did  not  have 
courage  to  leave  as  he  first  had  it." 

And  he  went  on  in  this  strain. 

While  he  was  speaking,  Mrs.  Boye  grew  more 
and  more  restless.  She  looked  nervously  first  to  one 
side,  then  to  the  other,  and  drummed  impatiently 
with  her  fingers,  while  her  face  was  clouded  by  a 
troubled  look  which  finally  deepened  to  one  of  pain. 

At  last  she  could  contain  herself  no  longer. 

"Don't  forget  what  you  were  going  to  say,"  she 
exclaimed,  "but  I  implore  you,  Mr.  Lyhne,  stop 
doing  that  with  your  hand  —  that  gesture  as  if  you 
were  pulling  teeth!  Please  do,  and  don't  let  me 
interrupt  you!  Now  I  am  all  attention  again,  and 
I  quite  agree  with  you." 

"But  then  it 's  of  no  use  to  say  any  more." 

"Why  not?" 

"When  we  agree ? " 

"When  we  agree ! " 

Neither  of  them  meant  anything  in  particular  by 


8o  NIELS  LYHNE 

these  last  words,  but  they  said  them  in  a  significant 
tone,  as  if  a  world  of  delicate  meanings  were  hid- 
den in  them,  and  looked  at  each  other  with  a  subtle 
smile,  like  an  afterglow  of  the  wit  that  had  just 
flashed  between  them,  while  each  wondered  what  the 
other  meant  and  felt  slightly  annoyed  at  being  so 
slow  of  comprehension. 

They  strolled  back  to  the  other  end  of  the  room, 
and  Mrs.  Boye  took  her  seat  on  the  low  chair  again. 

Erik  and  Frithjof  had  talked  till  they  were  begin- 
ning to  be  bored  with  each  other  and  were  glad  to 
be  joined  by  the  others.  Frithjof  approached  Mrs. 
Boye  and  made  himself  agreeable,  while  Erik,  with 
the  modesty  of  the  host,  kept  himself  in  the  back- 
ground. 

"If  I  were  curious,"  said  Frithjof,  "I  should 
inquire  what  the  book  was  that  made  you  and 
Refstrup  quarrel  just  as  we  were  coming  in." 

"Do  you  inquire?" 

"I  do." 

"Ergo?" 

"Ergo!"  replied  Frithjof  with  a  humble,  acqui- 
escent bow. 

She  held  up  the  book  and  solemnly  announced : 
"  //d'/^d',  Oehlenschlager's  Helge. — And  what  canto? 
It  was  'The  Mermaid  visits  King  Helge.' — And 
what  verse?  It  was  the  lines  telling  ofhowTangkjaer 
lay  down  by  Helge's  side,  and  how  he  could  n't 
control  his  curiosity  any  longer,  but  turned 


CHAPTER  VI  8i 

—  and  at  his  side^ 
With  white  arms  soft  and  round^ 
The  greatest  beauty  he  espied 
That  e'er  on  earth  was  found. 

The  maid  had  dojfed  her  cloak  of  gray; 
Her  lovely  limbs  were  bare,^ 
Save  for  the  robe  like  silver  spray 
That  veiled  her  form  so  fair. 

That  is  all  he  allows  us  to  see  of  the  mermaid's 
charms,  and  that  is  what  I  am  dissatisfied  with.  I 
want  a  luxuriant,  glowing  picture  there;  I  want  to 
see  something  so  dazzling  that  it  takes  my  breath 
away.  I  want  to  be  initiated  into  the  mysterious 
beauty  of  such  a  mermaid  body,  and  I  ask  of  you, 
what  can  I  make  of  lovely  limbs  with  a  piece  of 
gauze  spread  over  them?  Good  heavens!  No,  she 
should  have  been  naked  as  a  wave  and  with  the  wild 
lure  of  the  sea  about  her.  Her  skin  should  have 
had  something  of  the  phosphorescence  of  the  sum- 
mer ocean  and  her  hair  something  of  the  black,  tan- 
gled horror  of  the  seaweed.  Am  I  not  right?  Yes, 
and  a  thousand  tints  of  the  water  should  come  and 
go  in  the  changeful  glitter  of  her  eyes.  Her  pale 
breast  must  be  cool  with  a  voluptuous  coolness,  and 
her  limbs  have  the  flowing  lines  of  the  waves.  The 
power  of  the  maelstrom  must  be  in  her  kiss,  and  the 
yielding  softness  of  the  foam  in  the  embrace  of  her 
arms." 


82  NIELS  LYHNE 

She  had  talked  herself  into  a  glow,  and  stood 
/there  still  animated  by  her  theme,  looking  at  her 
young  listeners  with  large,  inquiring  child-eyes. 

But  they  said  nothing.  Niels  had  flushed  scarlet, 
and  Erik  looked  extremely  embarrassed.  Frithjof 
was  absolutely  carried  away  and  stared  at  her  with 
the  most  open  admiration,  though  of  the  three  he 
,  was  the  one  least  aware  how  entrancingly  beautiful 
she  was,  as  she  stood  there  with  the  glamor  of  her 
words  about  her. 
/  Not  many  weeks  had  passed  before  Niels  and 
/  Frithjof  were  as  constant  visitors  in  Mrs.  Boye'S 
\  home  as  Erik  Refstrup.  Besides  her  pale  niece,  they 
met  a  great  many  young  people,  coming  poets, 
painters,  actors,  and  architects,  all  artists  by  virtue 
of  their  youth  rather  than  their  talent,  all  full  of 
hope,  valiant,  lusting  for  battle,  and  easily  moved  to 
enthusiasm.  It  is  true,  there  were  among  them  some 
of  those  quiet  dreamers  who  bleat  wistfully  toward 
the  faded  ideals  of  the  past;  but  most  of  them  were 
full  of  ideas  that  were  modern  at  the  time,  drunk 
with  the  theories  of  modernity,  wild  with  its  powers, 
dazzled  by  its  clear  morning  light.  They  were  mod- 
ern, belligerently  modern,  modern  to  excess,  and 
perhaps  not  least  because  in  their  inmost  hearts 
therewas  a  strange,  instinctive  longing  which  had  to 
be  stifled,  a  longing  which  the  new  spirit  could  not 
satisfy  —  world-wide,  all-embracing,  all-powerful, 
and  all-enlightening  though  it  was. 


CHAPTER  VI  83 

But,  for  all  that,  the  exultation  of  the  storm  was 
in  their  young  souls.  They  had  faith  in  the  light  of 
the  great  stars  of  thought;  they  had  hope  fathom- 
less as  the  ocean.  Enthusiasm  bore  them  on  the 
wings  of  the  eagle,  and  their  hearts  expanded  with 
the  courage  of  thousands. 

No  doubt  life  would  in  time  wear  it  all  out,  lull 
most  of  it  to  sleep;  worldly  wisdom  would  break 
down  much,  and  cowardice  would  sweep  away  the 
rest  —  but  what  of  it?  The  time  that  has  gone  with 
happiness  does  not  come  back  with  grief,  and  noth- 
ing the  future  may  bring  can  wither  a  day  or  wipe 
out  an  hour  in  the  life  that  has  been  lived. 

To  Niels  the  world,  in  those  days,  began  to  wear 
a  different  aspect.  He  heard  his  own  vaguest,  most 
secret  thoughts  loudly  proclaimed  by  ten  differ- 
ent mouths.  He  saw  his  own  unique  ideas,  which  to 
him  had  been  a  misty  landscape,  with  lines  blurred 
by  fog,  with  unknown  depths  and  muted  notes, — 
he  saw  this  landscape  unveiled  in  the  bright,  clear, 
sharp  colors  of  day,  revealed  in  every  detail,  fur- 
rowed every  where  by  roads,  and  with  people  swarm- 
ing on  the  roads.  There  was  something  strangely 
unreal  in  the  very  fact  that  the  creations  of  his  fancy 
had  become  so  real.  | 

He  was  no  longer  a  lonely  child-king,  reigning  | 
over  lands  that  his  own  dreams  had  conjured  up.  I 
No,  he  was  one  of  a  crowd,  a  man  in  an  army,  a  sol-  ^ 
dier  in  the  service  of  modern  ideas.  A  sword  had 


> 


84  NIELS  LYHNE 

been  placed  in  his  hand,  and  a  banner  waved  before 
him. 

What  a  wonderful  time  full  of  promise!  And  how 
strange  to  hear  with  his  ears  the  indistinct,  myste- 
rious whisper  of  his  soul  now  sounding  through  the 
air  of  reality  like  wild,  challenging  trumpet-blasts, 
like  the  thunder  of  battering-rams  against  temple 
walls,  like  the  whizzing  of  David's  pebble  against 
Goliath's  brow,  like  exultant  fanfares.  It  was  as 
though  he  heard  himself  speaking  with  strange 
tongues,  with  a  clarity  and  power  not  his  own,  about 
that  which  belonged  to  his  deepest,  innermost  self. 

This  gospel  of  modernity,  with  its  message  of 
dissolution  and  perfection,  did  not  sound  only  from 
the  lips  of  his  contemporaries.  There  were  older 
men  with  names  that  carried  weight  whose  eyes  were 
likewise  open  to  the  glories  of  new  ideas.  These  men 
used  more  pompous  words  and  had  more  magnifi- 
cent conceptions ;  the  names  of  past  centuries  swept 
along  in  their  train;  history  was  with  them — the 
history  of  the  world  and  the  human  mind,  the  Odys- 
sey of  thought.  These  were  men  who  in  their  youth 
had  been  moved  bythe  very  things  that  now  thrilled 
the  young  people  and  had  borne  witness  to  the 
spirit  within  them ;  but  when  they  heard  in  their 
own  voices  the  sound  which  tells  a  man  crying  in 
the  wilderness  that  he  is  alone,  they  were  silenced. 
The  young  people,  however,  remembered  only  that 
these  men  had  spoken,  not   that  they  had   been 


CHAPTER  VI  85 

silent;  they  were  ready  to  bring  laurel  wreaths  and 
martyr  crowns,  willing  to  admire  and  happy  in  their 
admiration.  Nor  did  the  objects  of  their  homage 
repel  this  late-born  appreciation;  they  put  on  the 
crowns  in  good  faith,  looked  at  themselves  in  a  large 
and  historic  light,  and  poetized  out  of  their  past  the 
less  heroic  features;  as  for  the  old  conviction,  which 
ill  winds  had  cooled,  they  soon  talked  it  into  a  glow 
again. 

Niels  Lyhne's  family  in  Copenhagen,  more  par- 
ticularly the  old  Councillor  Neergaards,  were  not  at 
all  pleased  with  the  circle  their  young  relative  had 
entered.  It  was  not  the  modern  ideas  that  worried 
them,  but  rather  the  fact  that  some  of  the  young 
men  found  long  hair,  great  hunting-boots,  and  a 
slight  slovenliness  favorable  to  the  growth  of  such 
ideas,  and  though  Niels  himself  was  not  at  all  fanati- 
cal on  this  point,  it  was  annoying  to  meet  him,  and 
even  more  annoying  to  have  their  friends  meet  him, 
in  company  with  youths  who  could  be  thus  charac- 
terized. These  things,  however,  were  trifles  com- 
pared to  his  intimacy  with  Mrs.  Boye  and  his  fre- 
quenting the  theatre  in  company  with  her  and  her 
pale  niece. 

Not  that  there  was  anything  in  particular  to  be 
said  against  Mrs.  Boye, but  people  talked  about  her. 
They  said  a  great  many  things. 

She  was  well  born,  a  Konneroy,  and  the  Konne- 
roys  were  among  the  oldest,  most  finely  patrician 


86  NIELS  LYHNE 

families  in  town.  Yet  she  had  broken  with  them. 
Some  said  it  was  on  account  of  a  dissipated  brother, 
whom  they  had  sent  off  to  the  colonies  to  get  rid 
of  him.  Certain  it  was  that  the  break  was  complete, 
and  there  were  even  whispers  that  old  Konneroy 
had  cursed  her,  and  afterwards  had  had  an  attack  of 
his  bad  spring  asthma. 

All  this  had  happened  after  she  became  a  widow. 

Mr.  Boye,  her  husband,  had  been  a  pharmaceu- 
tist, an  assessor  pharmacia,  and  had  been  knighted. 
When  he  died  he  was  sixty  and  owned  a  barrel 
and  a  half  of  gold.  So  far  as  any  one  knew,  they  had 
lived  quite  happily  together.  In  the  first  three  years 
of  their  marriage,  the  elderly  husband  had  been  very 
much  in  love,  but  later  they  had  each  lived  their 
own  life,  he  busy  with  his  garden  and  with  keeping 
up  his  reputation  as  a  great  man  at  stag  parties,  she 
with  theatres,  romantic  music,  and  German  poetry. 

Then  he  died. 

When  the  year  of  mourning  was  over,  the  widow 
went  to  Italy  and  lived  there  for  two  or  three  years, 
spending  most  of  the  time  in  Rome.  There  was 
nothing  in  the  rumor  that  she  had  smoked  opium 
in  the  French  club,  nor  in  the  story  that  she  had  al- 
lowed herself  to  be  modelled  in  the  same  manner  as 
Paulina  Borghese;  and  the  little  Russian  prince  who 
shot  himself  while  she  was  in  Naples  did  not  com- 
mit suicide  for  her  sake.  It  was  true,  however,  that 
German  artists  never  tired  of  serenading  her;  and 


CHAPTER  VI  87 

it  was  true  that  one  morning  she  had  donned  the 
dress  of  an  Albanian  peasant  girl  and  had  seated 
herself  on  the  steps  of  a  church  high  up  in  the  Via 
Sistina,  where  a  newly  arrived  artist  had  engaged 
her  to  stand  as  a  model  for  him  with  a  pitcher  on 
her  head  and  a  little  brown  boy  holding  her  hand. 
At  least  there  was  such  a  picture  hanging  on  her 
wall. 

On  the  way  home  from  Italy  she  met  a  country- 
man^ a  noted  clever  critic,  who  would  rather  have 
been  a  poet.  A  negative,  sceptical  nature,  people 
called  him,  a  keen  mind,  one  who  dealt  harshly  and 
pitilessly  with  others  because  he  dealt  harshly  and 
pitilessly  with  himself  and  supposed  his  brutality 
to  be  justified  by  that  fact.  Nevertheless,  he  was  not 
quite  what  they  believed  him  to  be;  he  was  not  so 
repellently  uncompromising  nor  so  robustly  con- 
sistent as  he  appeared.  Although  he  was  always  in 
a  state  of  strife  against  the  idealistic  tendencies  of 
the  age  and  called  them  by  more  disparaging  names, 
still  he  felt  drawn  toward  these  dreamy,  ethereal 
ideals,  this  blue-blue  mysticism,  these  unattainable 
heights  and  evanescent  lights;  they  appealed  to  him 
more  than  the  earth-born  opinions  for  which  he  did 
battle  and  in  which,  most  of  the  time,  he  believed. 

Rather  against  his  will,  he  fell  in  love  with  Mrs. 
Boye,  but  he  did  not  tell  her  so,  for  his  was  not  a 
young  and  open  love,  nor  a  hopeful  one.  He  loved 
her  as  a  creature  of  another,  a  finer  and  happier  race 


88  NIELS  LYHNE 

than  his  own,  and  there  was  in  his  love  a  rancor, 
an  instinctive  rage  against  everything  in  her  that 
bore  the  marks  of  race. 

He  looked  with  hostile,  jealous  eyes  upon  her 
sentiments  and  opinions,  her  tastes  and  views  of 
life.  He  fought  with  every  weapon  he  possessed, 
with  subtle  eloquence,  with  heartless  logic  and  harsh 
authority,  with  derision  wrapped  in  pity,  to  bring 
her  over  to  his  side,  and  he  won.  But  when  truth 
had  conquered,  and  she  had  become  like  him,  he 
saw  that  the  victory  was  too  complete,  that  he  had 
loved  her  as  she  was,  with  her  illusions  and  preju- 
dices, her  dreams  and  her  errors,  and  not  as  she 
had  now  become.  Dissatisfied  with  himself,  with 
her,  and  with  everything  in  his  own  country,  he 
went  away  and  did  not  return.  But  then  she  had 
just  begun  to  love  him. 

This  relationship,  of  course,  gave  people  food 
for  talk,  and  they  made  the  most  of  it.  The  Coun- 
cillor's wife  told  Niels  about  it  in  the  tone  that 
aged  virtue  uses  in  speaking  of  young  error,  but 
Niels  took  it  in  a  manner  that  offended  and  hor- 
rified the  old  lady.  He  replied  in  a  high  strain  about 
the  tyranny  of  society  and  the  freedom  of  the  in- 
dividual, about  the  plebeian  respectability  of  the 
mob  and  the  nobility  of  passion. 

From  thctt  day  on  he  went  but  seldom  to  the 
home  of  his  solicitous  relatives,  but  Mrs.  Boye 
saw  him  all  the  more  frequently. 


Chapter  FII 

IT  was  an  evening  in  spring;  the  sun  threw  a 
red  light  into  the  room,  as  it  sank  toward  the 
horizon.  The  wings  of  the  windmill  on  the  embank- 
ment drew  shadows  over  the  window-panes  and  the 
walls,  coming,  going,  in  a  monotonous  swinging 
from  darkness  to  light:  a  moment  of  darkness,  two 
moments  of  light. 

At  the  window,  Niels  Lyhne  sat  gazing  through 
the  darkly  burnished  elms  on  the  embankment  to 
the  fiery  clouds  beyond.  He  had  been  in  the  coun- 
try, walking  under  blossoming  beeches,  past  green 
rye-fields, over  flower-decked  meadows.  Everything 
had  been  so  fair  and  light,  the  sky  so  blue,  the 
Sound  so  bright,  the  women  he  met  so  wondrously 
beautiful.  Singing,  he  had  followed  the  forest  path, 
but  soon  the  words  had  died  out  of  his  song,  then 
the  rhythm  was  lost,  at  last  the  tones  were  muted, 
and  silence  came  over  him  like  a  fit  of  giddiness. 
He  closed  his  eyes,  and  still  he  felt  how  his  body 
drank  the  light,  and  his  nerves  vibrated  with  it^ 
Every  breath  he  drew  of  the  cool,  intoxicating  air 
sent  his  blood  rushing  more  wildly  through  the 
quivering,  helpless  veins.  He  felt  as  though  all  the 
teeming,  budding,  growing,  germinating  forces  of 
spring  were  mysteriously  striving  to  vent  them- 
selves through  him  in  a  mighty  cry,  and  he  thirsted 


90  NIELS  LYHNE 

for  this  cry,  listened  for  it,  till  his  listening  grew 
into  a  vague,  turgid  longing. 

Now,  as  he  sat  there  by  the  window,  the  long- 
ing awoke  in  him  again. 

He  yearned  for  a  thousand  tremulous  dreams, 
for  cool  and  delicate  images,  transparent  tints,  fleet- 
ing scents,  and  exquisite  music  from  streams  of 
highly  strung,  tensely  drawn  silvery  strings  —  and 
then  silence,  the  innermost  heart  of  silence,  where 
the  waves  of  air  never  bore  a  single  stray  tone,  but 
where  all  was  rest  unto  death,  steeped  in  the  calm 
glow  of  red  colors  and  the  languid  warmth  of  fiery 
fragrance. — This  was  not  what  he  longed  for,  but 
the  images  glided  forth  from  his  mood  and  sub- 
merged all  else  until  he  turned  from  them  to  follow 
his  own  train  of  thought  again. 

He  was  weary  of  himself,  of  cold  ideas  and  brain- 
dreams.  Life  a  poem?  Not  when  you  went  about 
forever  poetizing  about  your  own  life  instead  of 
living  it.  How  innocuous  it  all  was,  and  empty, 
empty,  empty  !  This  chasing  after  yourself,  craftily 
observing  your  own  tracks  —  in  a  circle,  of  course. 
This  sham  diving  into  the  stream  of  life  while  all 
the  time  you  sat  angling  after  yourself,  fishing 
yourself  up  in  one  curious  disguise  or  another!  If 
he  could  only  be  overwhelmed  by  something — 
life,  love,  passion  —  so  that  he  could  no  longer 
shape  it  into  poems,  but  had  to  let  it  shape  him! 

Involuntarily  he  made  a  gesture  as  if  to  ward 


CHAPTER  VII  91 

it  off  with  his  hand.  After  all,  he  was  afraid  in  his 
inmost  heart  of  this  mighty  thing  called  passion. 
This  storm-wind  sweeping  away  everything  settled 
and  authorized  and  acquired  in  humanity  as  if  it 
were  dead  leaves.  He  did  not  like  it!  This  roaring 
flame  squandering  itself  in  its  own  smoke  —  no,  he 
wanted  to  burn  slowly. 

And  yet  this  living  on  at  half  speed  in  quiet 
waters,  always  in  sight  of  land,  seemed  so  paltry. 
Would  that  the  storm  and  waves  would  come!  If 
he  only  knew  how,  his  sails  should  fly  to  the  yards 
for  a  merry  run  over  the  Spanish  Main  of  life !  Fare- 
well to  the  slowly  dripping  days,  farewell  to  the 
pleasant  little  hours!  Peace  be  with  you,  you  dull 
moods  that  have  to  be  furbished  with  poetry  before 
you  can  shine,  you  lukewarm  emotions  that  have 
to  be  clothed  in  warm  dreams  and  yet  freeze  to 
death!  May  you  go  to  your  own  place !  I  am  headed 
for  a  coast  where  sentiments  twine  themselves  like 
luxuriant  vines  around  every  fibre  of  the  heart — a 
rank  forest;  for  every  vine  that  withers,  twenty  are 
in  blossom ;  for  each  one  that  blossoms,  a  hundred 
are  in  bud. 

Oh,  that  I  were  there! 

He  grew  tired  of  his  longing  and  sick  of  himself 
He  needed  people.  But  of  course  Erik  was  not  in 
now.  Frithjof  had  been  with  him  all  morning,  and 
it  was  too  late  for  the  theatre.  Nevertheless  he  went 
out  and  strolled  dejectedly  through  the  streets. 


92  NIELS  LYHNE 

Perhaps  Mrs.  Boye  would  be  in.  This  was  not 
one  of  her  evenings  and  it  was  rather  late.  Suppose 
he  try,  anyway. 

Mrs.  Boye  was  in.  She  was  home  alone.  Too 
tired  from  the  spring  air  to  go  to  a  dinner  party 
with  her  niece,  she  had  preferred  to  lie  on  the  sofa, 
drinking  strong  tea  and  reading  Heine;  but  now 
she  was  tired  of  verses  and  wanted  to  play  lotto. 
■  So  they  played  lotto.  Fifteen,  twenty,  thirty- 
$even,  a  long  series  of  figures,  the  rattling  of  dice 
in  a  bag,  and  an  irritating  sound  of  balls  rolling  on 
the  floor  in  the  apartment  above  them.  .  .  . 

"This  is  not  amusing,"  said  Mrs.  Boye,  when 
they  had  played  for  a  long  time  without  covering 
any  numbers.  "Is  it.^  —  No!"  she  answered  her- 
self and  shook  her  head  disconsolately.  "  But  what 
else  can  we  play?" 

She  folded  her  hands  before  her  on  the  disks  and 
looked  at  Niels  with  a  hopeless,  inquiring  gaze. 

Niels  really  did  not  know. 

"Anything  but  music  ! "  She  bent  her  face  down 
over  her  hands  and  touched  her  lips  to  the  knuckles, 
one  after  the  other,  the  whole  row,  then  back  again. 
"This  is  the  most  wretched  existence  in  the  world," 
she  said,  looking  up.  "It  is  n't  possible  to  have  any- 
thing like  an  adventure,  and  the  small  happenings 
that  life  has  to  offer  are  surely  not  enough  to  keep 
one's  spirits  up.  Don't  you  feel  that,  too?" 

"Well,  I  can't  suggest  anything  better  than  that 


CHAPTER  VII  93 

we  act  like  the  Caliph  in  Arabian  Nights.  With 
that  silk  kimono  you  are  wearing,  if  you  would  only 
wind  a  white  cloth  around  your  head,  and  let  me 
hav^e  your  large  Indian  shawl,  we  could  easily  pass 
for  two  merchants  from  Mossul.'* 

"And  what  should  we  two  unfortunate  mer- 
chants do?" 

"  Go  down  to  Storm  Bridge,  hire  a  boat  for  twenty 
pieces  of  gold,  and  sail  up  the  dark  river." 

"  Past  the  sand-chests  ? " 

"Yes,  with  colored  lamps  on  the  masthead." 

"Like  Ganem,the  Slave  of  Love.  —  Oh,  I  know 
that  line  of  thought  so  well !  It 's  exactly  like  a  man 
—  to  get  so  terribly  busy  building  up  scenery  and 
background,  forgetting  the  action  itself  for  the  set- 
ting. Have  you  never  noticed  that  women  live  much 
less  in  their  imagination  than  men?  We  don't  know 
how  to  taste  pleasure  in  our  fancy  or  escape  from 
pain  with  a  fanciful  consolation.  What  is,  is.  Ima- 
gination—  it  is  so  innocuous.  When  we  get  as  old 
as  I  am  now,  then  sometimes  we  content  ourselves 
with  the  poverty-stricken  comedy  of  imagination. 
But  we  ought  never  to  do  it — never!" 

She  settled  herself  languidly  on  the  sofa,  half 
reclining,  her  hand  under  her  chin,  her  elbow  sup- 
ported by  the  cushions.  She  gazed  dreamily  out 
before  her,  and  seemed  quite  lost  in  melancholy 
thoughts. 

Niels  was  silent  too,  and  the  room  was  so  quiet 


94  NIELS  LYHNE 

that  the  restless  hopping  of  the  canary  bird  was 
plainly  heard;  the  great  clock  ticked  and  ticked  its 
way  through  the  silence,  louder  and  louder,  and 
a  string  in  the  open  piano,  suddenly  vibrating, 
emitted  a  long,  low,  dying  note  that  blended  with 
the  softly  singing  stillness. 

She  looked  very  young  as  she  lay  there,  flooded 
from  head  to  foot  in  the  soft  yellowlightof  the  lamp 
above  her.  There  was  something  alluring  in  the  in- 
congruity of  her  beautiful,  strongly  moulded  throat 
and  matronly  Charlotte  Corday  cap  with  the  frank 
child-eyes  and  the  little  mouth  opening  over  milk- 
white  teeth. 

Niels  looked  at  her  admiringly. 

"How  strange  it  is  to  long  for  one's  self!"  she 
said;  "and  yet  I  often,  so  often,  long  for  myself  as 
a  young  girl.  I  love  her  as  one  whom  I  had  been 
\very  close  to  and  shared  life  and  happiness  and 
everything  with,  and  then  had  lost  while  I  stood 
helpless.  What  a  wonderful  time  that  was!  You 
c^Jinot  conceive  the  purity  and  delicacy  of  such  a 
young  girl's  soul  when  she  is  just  beginning  to  love 
for  the  first  time.  It  can  only  be  told  in  music,  but 
you  can  think  of  it  as  a  festival  in  a  fairy  palace, 
where  the  air  shines  like  blushing  silver.  It  is  filled 
with  cool  flowers,  and  they  change  color,  their  tints 
are  slowly  shifting.  Everything  is  song,  jubilant  and 
yet  soft.  Dim  presentiments  gleam  and  glow  like 
mystic  wine  in  exquisite  dream-goblets.  It  is  all 


CHAPTER  VII  95 

song  and  fragrance;  a  thousand  scents  are  wafted 
through  the  palace.  Oh,  I  could  weep  when  I  think 
of  it,  and  when  I  think  that  if  it  could  all  come  back 
to  me, by  a  miracle,  just  as  it  was,  it  would  no  longer 
bear  me  up ;  I  should  fall  through  like  a  cow  trying 
to  dance  on  cobwebs." 

"  No,  quite  the  contrary,'*  said  Niels  eagerly,  and 
his  voice  trembled,  as  he  went  on : "  no,  the  love  you 
could  feel  now  would  be  much  finer,  much  more 
spiritual  than  that  young  girl's." 

"  Spiritual!  I  hate  this  spiritual  love.  The  flowers 
growing  from  that  soil  are  made  of  cotton  cloth; 
they  don't  even  grow,  they  are  taken  from  the  head 
and  stuck  in  the  heart,  because  the  heart  has  no 
flowers  of  its  own.  That  is  exactly  what  I  envy  in 
the  young  girl:  everything  about  her  is  genuine,  she 
does  not  fill  the  goblet  of  her  love  with  the  make- 
shift of  imagination.  Do  not  suppose,  because  her 
love  is  shot  through  and  shadowed  over  by  ima- 
gined pictures  and  again  pictures  in  a  great,  teem- 
ing vagueness,  that  she  cares  more  for  those  images 
than  for  the  earth  she  walks  upon.  It  is  only  that 
all  her  senses  and  instincts  and  powers  are  reaching 
out  for  love  everywhere  —  everywhere,  without 
ever  feeling  weary.  But  she  does  not  revel  in  her 
fancies,  nor  even  so  much  as  rest  in  them ;  no,  she 
is  very  much  more  genuine,  so  genuine  that  in  her 
own  unwitting  manner  she  very  often  becomes  in- 
nocently cynical.  You  have  no  idea,  for  instance. 


-.V""'' 


96  NIELS  LYHNE 

of  what  intoxicating  pleasure  a  young  girl  finds  in 
breathing  secretly  the  odor  of  cigars  that  clings  to 
the  clothes  of  the  man  she  loves —  that  is  a  thou- 
sand times  more  to  her  than  a  whole  conflagration 
of  fancies.  I  despise  imagination.  What  good  is  it, 
when  our  whole  being  yearns  toward  the  heart  of  an- 
other, to  be  admitted  only  to  the  chilly  ante-room 
of  his  imagination!  And  that  is  what  happens  so 
often.  How  often  we  have  to  submit  to  letting  the 
man  we  love  deck  us  out  with  his  imagination,  put 
a  halo  around  our  head,  tie  wings  on  our  shoulders, 
and  wrap  us  in  a  star-spangled  robe !  Then  at  last 
he  finds  us  worthy  of  his  love,  when  we  masquerade 
in  this  costume;  but  then  we  can't  be  ourselves, 
because  we  are  too  dressed  up,  and  because  men 
confuse  us  by  kneeling  in  the  dust  and  worshipping 
us  instead  of  just  taking  us  as  we  are  and  simply 
loving  us." 

Niels  was  quite  bewildered.  He  had  picked  up 
the  handkerchief  she  dropped  and  sat  there  intoxi- 
cating himself  with  its  perfume.  He  was  not  at  all 
prepared  to  have  her  look  at  him  in  that  impatient, 
questioning  way,  just  as  he  was  absorbed  in  study- 
ing her  hand,  but  he  managed  to  answer  that  he 
thought  a  man  could  not  give  a  finer  proof  of  his 
love  than  this — that  he  had  tojustify  himself  to  him- 
self for  loving  a  human  being  so  unutterably,  and 
therefore  set  her  so  high  and  surrounded  her  with  a 
nimbus  of  divinitv. 


CHAPTER  VII  97 

"But  that  Is  just  what  I  find  so  insulting,"  said 
Mrs.  Boye,  "as  if  we  were  not  divine  enough  in 
ourselves." 

Niels  smiled  complacently. 

"No,  you  must  n't  smile,  I  'm  not  joking.  It  is 
really  very  serious,  for  this  adoration  is  at  bottom 
tyrannical  in  its  fanaticism;  it  cramps  us  in  a  mould 
of  man's  ideal.  Slash  a  heel  and  clip  a  toe!  Anything 
in  us  that  does  n't  square  with  man's  conception  has 
to  be  eliminated,  perhaps  not  by  force,  but  by  ignor- 
ing it,  systematically  relegating  it  to  oblivion,  and 
never  giving  it  a  chance  to  develop,  while  the  quali- 
ties we  don't  possess  or  that  are  n't  in  the  least  char- 
acteristic of  us  are  forced  to  the  rankest  growth  by 
lauding  them  to  the  skies,  taking  for  granted  that 
we  have  them  in  the  fullest  measure,  and  making 
them  the  cornerstone  on  which  man  builds  his  love. 
I  say  that  we  are  subjected  to  a  drill;  man's  love 
puts  us  through  a  drill.  And  we  submit  to  it,  even 
those  who  love  no  one  submit  to  it,  contemptible 
minions  that  we  are  !  '* 

She  had  risen  from  her  reclining  posture  and 
looked  threateningly  at  Niels. 

"If  I  were  beautiful  1^ — oh,  I  mean  ravishingly 
beautiful,  more  alluring  than  any  woman  who  ever 
lived,  so  that  all  who  saw  me  were  struck  with 
unquenchable,  agonizing  love  as  by  witchcraft — 
then  I  would  use  the  power  of  my  beauty  to  make 
them  adore  me^  not  their  traditional  bloodless  ideal. 


98  NIELS  LYHNE 

but  myself,  as  I  am,  every  inch,  every  line  of  my 
being,  every  gleam  oi  my  nature!'* 

She  had  risen  now  to  her  full  height,  and  Niels 
thought  he  ought  to  go,  but  he  stood  turning  over 
in  his  mind  a  great  many  audacious  words,  which, 
after  all,  he  did  not  dare  to  utter.  At  last,  summon- 
ing all  his  courage,  he  seized  her  hand  and  kissed 
it,  but  she  gave  him  her  other  hand  to  kiss  too, 
and  then  he  could  say  nothing  more  than:  "  Good- 
night." 

Niels  Lyhne  had  fallen  in  love  with  Mrs.  Boye, 
and  he  was  happy  because  of  it. 

When  he  went  home  through  the  same  streets 
where  he  had  strolled  so  dejectedly  that  same  even- 
ing, it  seemed  to  him  that  ages  had  passed  since  he 
walked  there.  His  bearing  had  acquired  a  new  poise, 
a  grave  decorum,  and  when  he  carefully  buttoned 
his  gloves,  he  did  so  with  a  subconscious  sense 
that  he  had  undergone  a  great  change  which  some- 
how demanded  that  he  should  button  his  gloves — j 
carefully. 

Too  much  absorbed  to  think  of  sleep,  he  went 
up  on  the  embankment. 

It  seemed  to  him  that  his  thoughts  flowed  very 
quietly.  He  was  surprised  at  his  own  calm,  but  he 
did  not  have  perfect  faith  in  it.  He  felt  as  though 
something  in  the  very  depths  of  his  being  were 
bubbling,  very  softly,  but  persistently:  welling  up, 
seething,  pressing  on,  but  far,  far  away.  He  was 


CHAPTER  VII  99 

in  a  mood  as  one  who  waits  for  something  that 
must  come  from  afar,  a  distant  music  that  must 
draw  near,  httle  by  httle,  singing,  murmuring,  froth- 
ing, rushing,  roaring,  and  whirhng  down  over  him, 
catching  him  up  he  knew  not  how,  carrying  him 
he  knew  not  whither,  coming  on  as  a  flood,  break- 
ing as  a  surf,  and  then  — 

But  now  he  was  calm.  There  was  only  the  trem- 
ulous singing  in  the  distance;  otherwise  all  was  peace 
and  tranquillity. 

He  loved — he  said  it  aloud  to  himself  again  and 
again.  The  words  had  such  a  strange  ring  of  dig- 
nity, and  held  such  deep  meanings.  They  meant 
that  he  was  no  longer  a  captive  in  the  imagined 
world  of  his  childhood,  nor  was  he  the  sport  of 
aimless  longings  and  misty  dreams.  He  had  es- 
caped from  the  elf-land  that  had  grown  up  with 
him  and  around  him,  encircling  him  with  a  hun- 
dred arms,  blindfolding  him  with  a  hundred  hands. 
He  had  broken  away  from  its  grasp  and  had  be- 
come master  of  himself,  and  though  it  reached  after 
him,  implored  him  with  dumb  appealing  eyes,  and 
beckoned  him  with  white  fluttering  garments,  its  / 
power  was  dead  as  a  dream  killed  by  day,  a  mist 
dispelled  by  the  sun.  Was  not  his  young  love  day 
and  sun  and  all  the  world?  He  had  been  strutting 
about  in  royal  purple  not  yet  spun,  and  had  taken 
his  seat  on  a  throne  not  yet  built;  but  now  he  stood 
on  a  high  mountain,  looking  out  over  the  world 


100  NIELS  LYHNE 

that  stretched  before  him  like  a  plain.  In  this  world 
thirsting  for  song  he  had  as  yet  no  existence  and 
was  not  even  awaited.  What  a  rapturous  thought 
it  was  that,  in  all  this  silent,  wakeful  infinity,  not 
a  breath  of  his  spirit  had  stirred  a  leaf  or  raised  a 
ripple.  It  was  all  his  to  win,  and  he  knew  that  he 
could  win  it.  He  felt  strong  and  all-conquering  as 
only  those  can  feel  whose  songs  are  still  unsung, 
throbbing  in  their  own  breast. 

The  soft  spring  air  was  full  of  perfumes,  not 
saturated  with  them  as  the  summer  nights  may  be, 
but  rather  as  it  were  streaked  —  now  with  the  pun- 
gent aroma  from  resinous  young  poplars,  now  with 
the  cool  breath  of  late  violets,  and  again  with  the 
sweet  almond  odor  of  cherry-trees.  The  scents 
came  and  mingled,  were  wafted  away  and  dissolved; 
sometimes  one  would  quicken  and  free  itself  from 
the  others,  only  to  die  as  suddenly  or  to  vanish 
slowly  on  a  breath  of  wind.  Light  moods  flitted 
across  his  mind  like  the  shadows  from  this  fitful 
dance  of  scents,  and  as  the  perfumes  mocked  his 
senses  by  coming  and  going  as  they  listed,  so  his 
mind  was  baflled  by  his  vain  longing  to  be  borne 
aloft,  calmly  resting  in  tranquil  flight  on  the  slowly 
gliding  wings  of  a  mood.  For  his  moods  were  not 
yet  birds  with  wings  strong  enough  to  carry  him ; 
they  were  down  and  feathers  only,  drifting  on  the 
wind,  falling  like  snow,  and  melting. 

He  tried  to  recall  the  picture  of  her  as  she  lay  on 


CHAPTER  VIJ  loi 

the  sofa  and  talked  to  him,  but  it  would  not  come. 
He  saw  her  vanishing  in  a  lane  of  trees;  or  sit- 
ting and  reading  with  her  hat  on,  holding  one  of 
the  large  white  leaves  in  her  gloved  fingers,  just  on 
the  point  of  turning  it,  then  turning  leaf  after  leaf. 
He  saw  her  entering  her  carriage  in  the  evening 
after  the  theatre  and  nodding  to  him  behind  the 
pane;  then  the  carriage  drove  away,  and  he  stood 
looking  after  it;  it  kept  on  driving,  and  he  still  fol- 
lowed it  with  his  eyes.  Indifferent  faces  came  and 
spoke  to  him,  figures  he  had  not  seen  for  years 
passed  down  the  street,  turned  and  looked  after 
him,  and  still  the  carriage  kept  on  driving,  and 
he  could  not  get  rid  of  it,  could  not  think  of  other 
pictures  because  of  that  carriage.  Then,  just  as  he 
was  getting  nervous  with  impatience,  it  came:  the 
yellow  light  from  the  lamp,  the  eyes,  the  mouth, 
the  hand  under  the  chin,  as  plainly  as  if  it  were  all 
before  him  there  in  the  darkness. 

How  lovely  she  was,  how  mild,  how  fair!  He 
loved  her  with  a  desire  that  knelt  at  her  feet,  beg- 
ging for  all  this  seductive  beauty.  Cast  yourself 
from  your  throne  down  to  me !  Make  yourself  my 
slave!  Put  the  chain  around  your  neck  with  your 
own  hands,  but  not  in  sport,  —  I  want  to  pull  the 
chain,  I  demand  submission  in  your  every  limb, 
bondage  in  your  eyes !  Oh,  that  I  could  draw  you 
to  me  with  a  love-philtre,  but,  no,  a  love-philtre 
would  compel  you,  you  would  yield  to  its  power 


(.0:2  NIELS  LYHNE 

without  volition,  and  I  want  none  to  be  your  mas- 
ter but  myself.  Your  will  must  be  broken  in  your 
hands,  and  you  must  hold  it  out  humbly  to  me. 
You  shall  be  my  queen,  and  I  your  slave,  but  my 
slave's  foot  must  be  on  your  queenly  neck.  There 
is  no  lunacy  in  this  desire,  for  is  it  not  in  the  na- 
ture of  a  woman's  love  to  be  proud  and  strong  and 
to  bend?  It  is  love,  I  know,  to  be  weak  and  to  reign. 
He  felt  that  he  could  never  draw  to  himself  the 
part  of  her  soul  that  was  one  with  the  luxuriant, 
glowing,  sensuous-soft  aspect  of  her  beauty;  it 
would  never  clasp  him  in  thosegleaming  Juno  arms, 
never  in  passionate  weakness  give  that  voluptuous 
neck  to  his  kisses  —  never  in  all  eternity.  He  saw 
it  all  clearly.  He  could  win,  perhaps  he  already  had 
won,  the  young  girl  in  her,  and  he  was  sure  that 
she,  the  full-blooded  beauty,  felt  this  fair  young 
creature  who  had  died  within  her  mysteriously 
stirring  in  her  living  grave  to  clasp  him  with  slen- 
der maiden  arms  and  meet  himi  with  timid  maiden 
lips.  But  his  love  was  not  that.  He  loved  the  very 
thing  in  her  that  he  could  not  win,  loved  this  neck 
with  its  warm,  flower-like  whiteness  gleaming  with  a 
dew  of  gold  under  the  dusky  hair.  He  sobbed  with 
yearning  passion  and  wrung  his  hands  with  impo- 
tent desire,  threw  his  arms  around  a  tree,  leaned 
his  cheek  against  the  bark,  and  wept.    - 


Chapter  VIII 

THERE  was  in  Niels  Lyhne's  nature  a  lame 
reflectiveness,  child  of  an  instinctive  shrink- 
ing from  decisive  action,  grandchild  of  a  subcon- 
scious sense  that  he  lacked  personality.  He  was 
always  struggling  against  this  reflectiveness,  some- 
times goading  himself  by  calling  it  vile  names,  then 
again  decking  it  out  as  a  virtue  that  was  a  part  of 
his  inmost  self  and  was  bound  up  with  all  his  pos- 
sibilities and  powers.  But  whatever  he  made  of  it, 
and  however  he  looked  upon  it,  he  hated  it  as  a 
secret  infirmity,  which  he  might  perhaps  hide  from 
the  world,  but  never  from  himself;  it  was  always 
there  to  humiliate  him  whenever  he  was  alone  with 
hims~elf.  How  he  envied  the  audacity  that  rushes 
confidently  into  words,  never  heeding  that  words 
bring  actions,  and  actions  bring  consequences  — 
until  those  consequences  are  at  its  heels.  People 
who  possessed  it  always  seemed  to  him  like  cen- 
taurs—  man  and  horse  cast  in  a  single  mould.  With 
them  impulse  and  leap  were  one,  whereas  he  was 
divided  into  rider  and  horse — impulse  one  thing, 
leap  something  very  diff^erent. 

Whenever  he  pictured  himself  declaring  his  love 
for  Mrs.  Boye — and  he  always  had  to  picture 
everything  —  he  could  plainly  see  himself  in  the 
scene,  his  attitude,  his  every  motion,  his  whole  fig- 
ure from  the  front,  from  the  side,  and  from  the 


104  NIELS  LYHNE 

back.  He  could  see  himself  falter  with  the  fever- 
ish irresolution  that  robbed  him  of  his  presence  of 
mind  and  paralyzed  him,  while  he  stood  there 
awaiting  her  answer  as  if  it  were  a  blow  forcing  him 
to  his  knees,  instead  of  a  shuttlecock  to  be  thrown 
back  in  ever  so  many  ways  and  returned  in  as  many 
more. 

He  thought  of  speaking,  and  he  thought  of  writ- 
ing, but  he  never  managed  simply  to  blurt  it  out. 
It  was  said  only  in  veiled  declarations  and  in  a  half- 
feigned  lyric  passion  that  made  a  pose  of  being  car- 
ried away  into  hot  words  and  fantastic  hopes.  Never- 
theless, a  certain  intimacy  of  a  strange  kind  grew 
up  between  them,  born  of  a  youth's  humble  love, 
a  dreamer's  ardent  longing,  and  a  woman's  pleasure 
in  being  the  inaccessible  object  of  romantic  desire. 
Their  relation  took  the  form  of  a  myth  that  arose, 
neither  of  them  knew  how,  a  pale,  still  myth  bred 
in  a  drawing-room.  Its  heroine  was  a  fair  woman 
who  had  loved  in  her  early  youth  one  of  the  great 
men  in  the  world  of  thought.  He  had  gone  away 
to  die  in  a  strange  land,  forgotten  and  forsaken. 
And  the  fair  woman  sat  sorrowing  for  many  long 
years,  though  none  knew  her  suffering;  solitude 
alone  was  sacred  enough  to  look  upon  her  grief. 
Then  came  a  youth  who  called  the  departed  great 
one  master,  who  was  filled  with  his  spirit  and  enthu- 
siastic for  his  work.  And  he  loved  the  sorrowing 
woman.  To  her  it  seemed  that  the  dead  happy  days 


CHAPTER   VIII  105 

rose  from  their  grave  and  came  to  life  again.  A 
sweet,  strange  bewilderment  came  over  her;  past 
and  present  were  blurred  in  the  silvery  mist  of  a 
shadowy  dream-day,  in  which  she  loved  the  youth, 
partly  as  himself  and  partly  as  the  image  of  another, 
and  gave  him  the  half  of  her  soul.  But  he  must 
tread  softly,  lest  the  dream-bubble  should  burst; 
he  must  put  a  stern  bar  to  all  hot  earthly  longings, 
lest  they  should  dispel  the  tender  twilight  and  wake 
her  to  sorrow  again. 

Sheltered  by  this  myth,  their  intimacy  gradually 
took  on  a  stable  form.  They  called  each  other  by 
their  Christian  names  and  were  Niels  and  Tema 
to  each  other  when  they  were  alone,  while  the  pres- 
ence of  the  niece  was  reduced  to  a  minimum.  To  be 
sure,  Niels  sometimes  tried  to  break  through  the 
accepted  barriers,  but  Mrs.  Boye  was  so  much  the 
stronger  that  she  could  easily  and  gently  quell  all 
such  attempts  at  insubordination,  and  Niels  had  to 
submit  and  fall  back  for  a  time  on  this  fanciful  pas- 
sion with  real  tableaux.  Their  relation  never  ran 
out  into  a  platonic  flatness;  nor  did  it  sink  to  rest 
in  the  monotony  of  habit.  Rest  was  the  word  that 
least  of  all  described  it.  Niels  Lyhne^s  hope  was 
never  weary,  and  though  it  was  gently  suppressed 
whenever  it  would  flare  up  in  a  demand,  that  only 
made  it  smolder  more  hotly  than  ever  in  secret. 
And  how  Mrs.  Boye  would  feed  the  fire  by  her 
thousand  and  one  coquetries,  her  provocative  sim- 


io6  NIELS  LYHNE 

plicity,  and  her  naked  courage  in  discussing  the 
most  delicate  subjects!  Besides,  the  game  was  not 
entirely  in  her  hands,  for  there  were  times  when  her 
blood  would  dream  in  its  idleness  of  rewarding  this 
half-tamed  devotion  by  lavishing  on  it  the  fullest 
rapture  of  love  in  order  to  rejoice  in  its  wondering 
happiness.  But  such  a  dream  was  not  easily  extin- 
guished, and  the  next  time  Niels  came  she  would 
meet  him  with  the  nervousness  of  conscious  sin, 
a  shyness  born  of  wrongdoing,  a  sweet  shame  that 
made  the  air  strangely  tremulous  with  passion. 

There  was  yet  another  thing  that  gave  their  in- 
timacy a  certain  tension.  Niels  Lyhne's  love  pos- 
sessed so  much  virility  that  he  chivalrously  held 
himself  back  from  taking  in  imagination  what  the 
reality  denied  him,  and  even  in  that  separate  world 
where  everything  did  his  bidding  he  respected  Mrs. 
Boye  as  if  she  were  actually  present. 

Hence  their  relation  was  well  buttressed  from 
both  sides,  and  there  was  no  immediate  danger  that 
it  would  fall  to  pieces.  Indeed,  it  seemed  made  for 
a  nature  at  once  brooding  and  athirst  for  lif|  such 
as  Niels  Lyhne's,  and  though  it  was  only  a  game, 
it  was  a  game  of  realities,  sufficient  to  give  him  that 
undercurrent  of  passion  which  he  needed. 

Niels  Lyhne  was  bent  upon  being  a  poet,  and 
there  was  much  in  the  external  circumstances  of  his 
life  to  lead  his  thoughts  in  that  direction  and  stim- 
ulate his  faculties  for  the  task.  So  far,  however,  he 


CHAPTER  VIII  107 

had  little  but  his  dreams  to  write  about,  and  no- 
where is  there  more  sameness  and  monotony  than 
in  the  world  of  imagination ;  for  in  that  dreamland, 
which  seems  so  boundless  and  so  infinitely  varied, 
there  are,  in  fact,  only  a  few  short  beaten  paths 
where  everybody  walks  and  from  which  no  one 
ever  strays.  People  may  differ,  but  in  their  dreams 
they  do  not  differ;  there  they  always  attain  the 
three  or  four  things  that  they  desire  —  it  may  be 
with  more  or  less  speed  and  completeness,  but  they 
always  attain  them  in  the  end.  No  one  seriously 
dreams  of  himself  as  empty-handed.  Therefore  no 
one  ever  discovers  himself  in  his  dreams  or  becomes 
conscious  through  them  of  his  individuality.  Our 
dreams  tell  nothing  of  how  we  are  satisfied  when 
we  win  the  treasure,  how  we  relinquish  it  when  lost, 
how  we  feast  on  it  while  it  is  ours,  where  we  turn 
when  it  is  taken  from  us. 

Niels  Lyhne's  poetry  had  hitherto  been  nothing 
but  the  expression  of  an  esthetic  personality  which, 
in  a  general  way,  found  spring  teeming,  the  ocean 
wide,  love  erotic,  and  death  melancholy.  He  him- 
self was  not  in  his  poems;  he  merely  put  the  verses 
together.  But  now  a  change  came  over  him.  Now 
that  he  wooed  a  woman  and  wanted  her  to  love 
him, — him,  Niels  Ly  h  ne  of  Lonborggaard,  who  was 
twenty-rhree  years  old,  walked  with  a  slight  stoop, , 
had  beautiful  hands  and  small  ears,  and  was  a  little 
timid,  wanted  her  to  love  him  and  not  the  idealized 


io8  NIELS  LYHNE 

Nicolaus  of  his  dreams,  who  had  a  proud  bearing 
and  confident  manners,  and  was  a  little  older,  — 
how  he  began  to  take  a  vital  interest  in  this  Niels 
whom  he  had  hitherto  walked  about  with  as  a 
slightly  unpresentable  friend.  He  had  been  so  busy 
decking  himself  with  the  qualities  he  lacked  that 
he  had  not  had  time  to  take  note  of  those  he  pos- 
y  sessed,  but  now  he  began  to  piece  his  own  self  to- 
gether from  scattered  memories  and  impressions  of 
his  childhood  and  from  the  most  vivid  moments 
of  his  life.  He  saw  with  pleased  surprise  how  it  all 
fitted  together,  bit  by  bit,  and  was  welded  into  a 
much  more  familiar  personality  than  the  one  he  had 
chased  after  in  his  dreams.  This  figure  was  far  more 
genuine,  far  stronger,  and  more  richly  endowed.  It 
was  no  mere  dead  stump  of  an  ideal,  but  a  living 
thing,  full  of  infinite  shifting  possibilities  playing 

(through  it  and  shaping  it  to  a  thousandfold  unity. 
Good  God,  he  ka^  powers  that  could  be  used  just 
as  they  were!  He  was  Aladdin,  and  there  was  not 
a  thing  he  had  been  storming  the  clouds  for  but  it 
had  fallen  right  down  into  his  turban.        * 

Now  came  a  happy  time  for  Niels,  the  glorious 
time  when  the  mighty  impulse  of  growth  sweeps  us 
jubilantly  past  the  dead  points  in  our  own  nature ; 
when  we  are  filled  to  bursting  with  a  strength  that 
makes  us  eager  to  put  our  shoulders  to  mountains 
if  need  be,  while  we  build  away  bravely  on  the 
Tower  of  Babel,  which  is  meant  to  pierce  the  sky. 


CHAPTER  VIII  109 

but  ends  in  being  just  a  squatty  structure  that  we 
go  on  all  our  lives  adding  to — now  a  timid  spire, 
now  a  freakish  bay  window. 

Everything  was  changed;  his  nature,  his  facul- 
ties, and  his  work  fitted  into  one  another  like 
cogged  wheels.  He  could  never  think  of  stopping 
to  rejoice  in  his  art,  for  a  thing  was  no  sooner  fin- 
ished than  itwas  cast  aside:  he  had  outp-rownit  even 
while  he  worked  on  it,  and  it  became  a  mere  step 
that  led  upward  to  an  ever-receding  goal,  one  of 
many  steps  on  a  road  he  had  left  behind  him  and 
forgotten  even  while  it  resounded  with  his  footfall. 

While  he  felt  himself  borne  along  by  new  im- 
pulses and  new  thoughts  to  greater  power  and 
wider  vision,  he  grew  more  and  more  solitary.  One 
after  another  of  his  old  friends  and  comrades  fell 
back  and  vanished  from  his  ken,  for  he  lost  interest 
in  them  when  he  saw  less  and  less  difference  be- 
tween these  men  of  theopposition  and  that  majority 
which  they  attacked.  Everything  seemed  to  him  to 
melt  together  in  one  great  hostile  mass  of  bore- 
dom. What  did  they  write  when  they  gave  the  call 
to  battle?  Pessimistic  verses  in  which  they  declared 
that  dogs  were  often  more  faithful  than  men  and 
jailbirds  more  honest  than  those  who  walked  freely 
about,  eloquent  odes  to  the  effect  that  green  woods 
and  brown  heath  were  preferable  to  dusty  cities, 
stories  of  peasant  virtue  and  rich  men's  vice,  of  red- 
blooded  nature  and  anemic  civilization,  the  narrow- 


no  NIELS  LYHNE 

ness  of  age  and  the  divine  right  of  youth.  What 
modest  demands  they  made  when  they  wrote !  They 
were  at  least  bolder  when  they  talked  within  four 
safe  walls.  > 

No,  when  his  time  came,  he  would  give  them 
music  —  a  clarion  call! 

His  older  friendships  suffered  too,  especially  that 
with  Frithjof.  The  fact  was  that  Frithjof,  who  had 
a  very  positive  natureja  good  head  for  systems^  and 
a  broad  back  for  dogmas,  had  read  a  little  too  much 
Heiberg,and  had  taken  it  all  for  gospel  truth,  never 
suspecting  that  the  makers  of  systems  are  clever 
folkwho  fashion  their  systems  from  their  books  and 
not  their  books  from  their  systems.  It  is  a  well- 
known  fact  that  young  people  who  have  committed 
themselves  to  a  system  generally  become  great 
dogmatists,  because  of  the  praiseworthy  affection 
youth  often  bears  to  what  is  finished  and  finite.  And 
when  you  have  become  the  possessor  of  the  whole 
truth,  it  would  be  unpardonable  to  keep  it  for  your- 
self alone  and  to  allow  less  fortunate  fellow  creatures 
to  go  their  own  misguided  way,  instead  of  leading 
and  instructing  them,  pruning  away  their  wild 
shoots  with  loving  severity,  forcing  them  up  against 
the  wall  with  gentle  coercion,  and  pointing  out  to 
them  the  lines  along  which  they  must  grow,in  order 
that  they  may  sometime,  when  they  have  been 
formed  into  correct  and  artistic  espaliers,  thank  you, 
even  if  tardily,  for  the  trouble  you  have  taken. 


CHAPTER  VIII  III 

Niels  was  fond  of  saying  that  he  liked  nothing 
better  than  criticism,  but  the  truth  was  that  he 
preferred  admiration,  and  he  certainly  would  not 
brook  criticism  from  Frithjof,  whom  he  had  always 
regarded  as  his  serf,  and  who  had  always  been  de- 
lighted to  wear  the  livery  of  his  opinions  and  his 
principles.  And  here  he  was  trying  to  play  the  equal 
and  to  masquerade  in  a  self-chosen  mantle!  Of 
course  he  must  be  snubbed,  and  Niels  first  tried,  in 
a  tone  of  good-natured  superiority,  to  make  Frith- 
jof ridiculous  in  his  own  eyes,  but  when  that  would 
not  work  he  had  recourse  to  insolent  paradoxes, 
which  he  would  scorn  to  discuss,  simply  throwing 
them  out  in  all  their  grotesque  hideousness  and 
then  retiring  behind  a  teasing  silence. 

In  this  way  they  grew  apart. 

With  Erik  he  got  on  better.  Their  boyish  friend- 
ship had  always  kept  a  certain  reserve,  a  kind  of 
spiritual  modesty,  and  this  had  saved  them  from  the 
too  great  familiarity  that  is  so  dangerous  to  friend- 
ship. They  had  been  enthusiastic  together  in  the  fes- 
tival hall  of  their  souls  and  had  chatted  intimately 
in  the  drawing-room,  but  they  had  never  made  free 
with  each  other's  bed-rooms,  bath-rooms,  and  other 
private  places  in  the  mansion  of  their  souls. 

It  was  the  same  now ;  indeed,  the  reserve  was,  if 
anything,  stricter,  at  least  on  Niels's  part,  but  that 
did  not  lessen  their  friendship,  the  corner-stone  of 
which,  now  as  of  old,  was  Niels  Lyhne's  admiration 


\ 


112  NIELS  LYHNE 

for  Erik's  spirit  and  audacity,  his  way  of  seeming  at 
home  with  life,  and  his  readiness  to  grasp  and  hold. 
Yet  Niels  could  not  conceal  from  himself  that  the 
friendship  was  extremely  one-sided.  Not  that  Erik 
was  wanting  in  real  affection  or  faith  in  him — far 
from  it.  No  one  could  think  more  highly  of  Niels 
than  Erik  did;  he  considered  him  so  vastly  his  own 
superior  in  intellect  that  he  never  dreamed  of  criti- 
cizing, but  this  blind  admiration  led  him  to  place 
Niels  and  his  work  and  interests  too  far  beyond 
the  horizon  his  own  eyes  could  scan.  He  was  sure 
that  Niels  would  go  far  along  the  road  he  had 
chosen,  but  he  was  equally  sure  that  his  own  feet  had 
nothing  to  do  on  that  path,  nor  did  he  ever  attempt 
to  set  them  there. 

Niels  felt  that  this  was  rather  hard;  for  though 
Erik's  ideals  were  not  his,  and  though  Erik  in  his 
art  tried  to  express  a  romanticism  or  a  romantic 
sentimentalism  with  which  he  was  not  in  accord, 
he  could  still  feel  a  broader  sympathy  by  virtue  of 
which  he  faithfully  followed  his  friend's  develop- 
ment, rejoiced  with  him  when  he  gained  a  step,  and 
helped  him  to  hope  when  he  stood  still. 

In  this  way  their  friendship  was  one-sided,  and 
it  was  not  strange  that  Niels  should  have  his  eyes 
opened  to  the  lack  in  it  just  at  the  time  when  his 
own  mind  was  struggling  with  new  ideas,  and  he  felt 
the  need  of  pouring  out  his  thoughts  to  a  sympa- 
thetic listener.  It  made  him  bitter,  and  he  began 


CHAPTER  VIII  113 

to  examine  more  closely  this  friend  whom  he  had 
always  judged  so  leniently.  A  dreary  sense  of  lone- 
liness came  over  him  as  he  realized  how  everything 
he  had  brought  with  him  from  home  and  from  the 
old  days  seemed  to  fall  away  from  him  and  let  him 
go  his  own  way,  forgotten  and  forsaken.  The  door 
to  the  past  was  barred, and  he  stood  outside,  empty- 
handed  and  alone;  whatever  he  needed  and  desired 
he  must  win  for  himself — new  friends  and  new 
shelter^  new  affections  and  new  memories. 


For  more  than  a  year,  Mrs.  Boye  had  been  Niels's 
only  real  companion,  when  a  letter  from  his  mother, 
telling  him  that  his  father  was  dangerously  ill,  called 
him  back  to  Lonborggaard. 

When  he  arrived,  his  father  was  dead. 

The  consciousness  that  for  several  years  he  had 
longed  very  little  for  his  home  weighed  on  Niels 
almost  like  a  crime.  He  had  often  enough  visited 
it  in  his  thoughts,  but  always  as  a  guest  with  the 
dust  of  other  lands  on  his  clothes  and  the  mem- 
ories of  other  places  in  his  heart:  he  had  never 
longed  for  it  in  passionate  homesickness  as  for  the 
fair  sanctuary  of  his  life,  nor  pined  to  kiss  its  soil 
and  rest  under  its  roof.  Now  he  repented  that  he 
had  been  faithless  to  his  home,  and,  oppressed  as 
he  was  by  his  grief,  he  felt  his  remorse  darkened 
by  a  sense  that  in  some  mysterious  way  he  was  an 


114  NIELS  LYHNE 

accessory  to  what  had  happened,  as  though  his  faith- 
lessness had  called  death  in.  He  wondered  how  he 
could  ever  have  lived  contentedly  away  from  this 
home  which  now  drew  him  with  such  strange  power. 
With  every  fibre  of  his  being  he  clung  to  it,  in  an 
infinite,  desolate  longing,  uneasy  because  he  could 
not  become  one  with  it  as  fully  as  he  would,  mis- 
erable because  the  thousand  memories  that  called 
from  every  corner  and  every  bush,  from  sounds 
and  myriad  scents,  from  the  play  of  light  and  from 
the  silence  itself,  —  because  all  these  things  called 
with  such  distant  voices  that  he  could  not  grasp 
them  in  the  strength  and  fullness  he  craved;  they 
seemed  only  to  whisper  in  his  soul  like  the  rustling 
of  leaves  that  fall  to  the  ground  and  the  lapping 
of  waves  that  flow  on  and  ever  on.  .  .  . 

Happy  in  his  sorrow  is  he  who  at  the  death  of 
one  dear  to  him  can  weep  all  his  tears  over  the 
emptiness,  the  desolation,  and  the  loneliness.  Sorer 
and  bitterer  are  the  tears  with  which  you  try  to 
atone  for  the  past  when  you  have  failed  in  love 
toward  one  who  is  gone  and  to  whom  you  can 
never  make  amends  for  what  you  have  sinned.  For 
now  they  come  back  to  you:  not  only  the  hard 
words,  the  subtly  poisoned  retorts,  the  harsh  cen- 
sure, and  the  unreasoning  anger,  but  even  unkind 
thoughts  that  were  not  put  into  words,  hasty  judg- 
ments that  merely  passed  through  your  mind,  un- 
seen shruggings  of  the  shoulder,  and  hidden  smiles 


CHAPTER  VIII  115 

full  of  contempt  and  impatience,  they  all  come  back 
like  malign  arrows,  sinking  their  barb  deep  in  your 
own  breast,  their  dull  barb,  for  the  point  has  been 
broken  off  in  the  heart  that  is  no  more.  There  is 
nothing  you  can  expiate  any  more,  nothing.  Now 
there  is  abundance  of  love  in  your  heart,  now  that 
it  is  too  late.  Go  now  to  the  cold  grave  with  your 
full  heart!  Does  it  bring  you  any  nearer?  Plant 
flowers  and  bind  wreaths — does  that  help  youP 

At  Lonborggaard  they  were  binding  wreaths; 
there,  too,  they  were  haunted  by  memories  of  hours 
when  love  had  been  silenced  by  harsher  voices;  to 
them,  too,  the  stern  lines  about  the  closed  mouth 
of  the  grave  spoke  of  remorse. 

It  was  a  dark,  sad  time,  but  it  held  a  ray  of  light 
in  that  it  brought  mother  and  son  more  closely 
together  than  they  had  been  for  many,  many  years ; 
for  in  spite  of  the  great  love  they  bore  to  each  other, 
they  had  always  been,  as  it  were,  on  their  guard 
each  toward  the  other,  and  there  had  been  a  cer- 
tain reserve  in  their  intercourse,  from  the  time 
when  Niels  grew  too  large  to  sit  on  his  mother's 
knee.  He  had  shrunk  from  the  excitable  and  high- 
strung  side  of  her  nature,  while  she  had  felt  some- 
thing alien  in  the  timidity  and  hesitation  of  his. 
But  now  life  itself,  which  keys  up  and  tones  down 
and  harmonizes,  had  prepared  their  hearts,  and 
would  soon  give  them  wholly  to  each  other. 

Scarcely  two  months  after  the  funeral, Mrs. Lyhne 


ii6  NIELS  LYHNE 

fell  violently  ill,  and  for  a  long  time  her  life  was  in 
danger.  The  anxiety  that  filled  these  weeks  seemed 
to  force  their  earlier  grief  into  the  background,  and 
when  Mrs.  Lyhne  began  to  get  better,  it  seemed 
to  both  her  and  Niels  that  years  had  been  thrust 
in  between  them  and  the  freshly  made  grave.  Espe- 
cially to  Mrs.  Lyhne  the  time  seemed  long.  While 
she  was  ill  she  had  been  sure  that  she  was  going  to 
die  and  had  been  very  much  afraid  of  death.  Even 
now  that  she  had  begun  to  recover,  and  the  doctor 
had  declared  the  danger  to  be  past,  she  could  not 
rid  herself  of  her  gloomy  thoughts. 

It  was  a  dreary  convalescence,  in  which  her 
strength  returned  as  it  seemed  reluctantly,  drop  by 
drop.  She  felt  no  gentle  and  healing  drowsiness, 
but  rather  a  restless  languor  with  a  depressing  sense 
of  weakness  and  an  incessant,  impotent  longing  for 
strength. 

After  a  while  there  was  a  change;  her  recovery 
was  more  rapid,  and  her  strength  came  back.  Still 
the  idea  that  she  and  life  were  soon  to  part  did 
not  leave  her,  but  lay  like  a  shadow  over  her  and 
held  her  captive  in  a  perturbed  and  yearning  mel- 
ancholy. 

One  evening  she  was  sitting  alone  in  the  summer 
parlor,  gazing  out  through  the  wide-open  doors. The 
trees  of  the  garden  hid  the  gold  and  crimson  of  the 
sunset,  but  in  one  spot  the  trunks  parted  to  reveal 
a  bit  of  fiery  sky,  from  which  a  sunburst  of  long. 


CHAPTER  VIII  117 

deep  golden  rays  shot  out,  waking  green  tints  and 
bronze-brown  reflections  in  the  dark  leafy  masses. 

High  above  the  restless  tree-tops,  the  clouds 
drifted  dark  against  a  smoke-red  sky,  and  as  they 
hurried  on,  they  left  behind  them  little  loosened 
tufts,  tiny  little  strips  of  cloud  which  the  sunlight 
steeped  in  a  wine-colored  glow. 

Mrs.  Lyhne  sat  listening  to  thewind  in  the  trees. 
Her  head  moved  very  slightly  in  time  with  the  un- 
even swelling  and  sinking  of  each  gust,  as  it  came 
rushing,  swept  on  boisterously,  and  died  away.  But 
her  eyes  were  far  away,  farther  even  than  the  clouds 
they  gazed  on.  Pale  in  her  black  widow's  garb,  she 
sat  there  with  a  piteous  expression  of  unrest  about 
herfaintlycolored  lips,  while  her  hands  fidgeted  with 
the  thick  little  book  on  her  lap.  It  was  Rousseau's 
Heldise,  Other  books  were  piled  up  around  her: 
Schiller,  Staffeldt,  Evald,  and  Novalis,  and  large 
portfolios  with  prints  of  old  churches  and  ruins  and 
mountain  lakes. 

Now  she  heard  doors  opening  and  shutting, then 
steps  that  seemed  to  seek  some  one  in  the  inner 
rooms,  and  presently  Niels  came  in.  He  had  been 
for  a  long  walk  by  the  fjord.  His  cheeks  were  ruddy 
from  the  fresh  air,  and  the  wind  was  still  in  his  hair. 

Outside,  the  blue-gray  colors  had  prevailed  in 
the  sky,  and  a  few  heavy  drops  of  rain  splashed 
against  the  windows. 

Niels  told  of  how  high  the  waves  came  rolling 


ii8  NIELS  LYHNE 

In  and  how  they  had  washed  the  seaweed  up  on  the 
beach,  and  about  what  he  had  seen  and  whom  he 
had  met.  As  he  talked,  he  gathered  up  the  books, 
closed  the  doors  to  the  garden,  and  fastened  the 
windows.  Then  he  sat  down  on  the  low  stool  at  his 
mother's  feet,  took  her  hand  in  his,  and  laid  his 
cheek  on  her  knee. 

It  had  grown  quite  black  outside;  the  rain  beat 
like  hail  and  ran  in  streams  down  casements  and 
panes. 

"  Do  you  remember,''  said  Niels  after  a  long  si- 
lence,— "do  you  remember  how  often  we  sat  like  this 
in  the  dusk  and  went  out  in  search  of  adventures, 
while  father  was  talking  to  Jens  Overseer  in  his 
office,  and  Duysen  was  rattling  the  teacups  in  the 
dining-room?  And  when  the  lamp  was  brought  in, 
we  both  woke  up  from  our  strange  adventures  to  the 
sheltered  comfort  around  us,  yet  I  can  well  remem- 
ber that  I  always  thought  the  story  did  not  stop 
when  we  did,  but  went  on  unfolding  somewhere 
under  the  hills  on  the  way  to  Ringkjobing." 

He  did  not  see  his  mother's  wistful  smile,  but  he 
felt  her  hand  passing  gently  over  his  hair. 

"Do  you  remember,"  she  said  after  a  while,  "how 
often  you  promised  me  that  when  you  grew  up  you 
would  sail  out  in  a  big  ship  and  bring  me  back  all 
the  treasures  of  the  world?" 

"Do  I  remember!  I  was  to  bring  hyacinths,  be- 
cause you  loved  hyacinths  so  much, and  a  palm  like 


CHAPTER  VIII  119 

the  one  that  died,  and  pillars  of  gold  and  marble. 
There  were  so  many  pillars  in  your  stories,  always. 
Do  you  remember.^" 

"  I  have  been  waiting  for  that  ship  —  no,  sit  still, 
dear,  you  don't  understand  me  —  it  was  not  for  my- 
self, it  was  the  ship  of  your  fortune.  ...  I  hoped 
your  life  would  be  full  and  glorious,  that  you  would 
travel  on  shining  paths.  .  .  .  Fame — everything  — 
No,  not  that,  if  you  would  only  be  one  of  those 
who  fight  for  the  greatest.  I  don't  know  how  it  is, 
but  I  am  so  tired  of  commonplace  happiness  and 
commonplace  goals.  Do  you  understand  me?" 

"You  wanted  me  to  be  a  Sunday  child,  mother 
dear,  one  of  those  who  do  not  pull  in  harness  with 
others,  but  have  their  own  heaven  to  be  saved  in, 
and  their  own  place  of  damnation  all  to  themselves, 
too.  —  We  wanted  to  have  flowers  on  board,  did  n't 
we.^  Gorgeous  flowers  to  strew  over  a  bleak  world ; 
but  the  ship  did  not  come,  and  they  were  poor 
birds,  Niels  and  his  mother,  were  they  not?" 

"Have  I  hurt  you,  dear?  Why,  it  was  nothing 
but  dreams;  don't  mind  them  ! " 

Niels  was  silent  a  long  time,  for  he  felt  a  shyness 
about  what  he  wanted  to  say.  "  Mother,"  he  said, 
"we  are  not  so  poor  as  you  think.  Some  day  the 
ship  will  come  in. — If  you  would  only  believe  that 
and  believe  in  me.  .  .  .  Mother — I  am  a  poet — 
really — through  my  whole  soul.  Don't  imagine 
this  is  childish  dreams  or  dreams  fed  by  vanity.  If 


120  NIELS  LYHNE 

you  could  feel  my  grateful  pride  in  what 's  best  in 
me — my  humble  joy  in  saying  this,  so  little  per- 
sonal, so  far  from  vainglory,  you  would  believe  it 
just  as  I  want  you  to  believe  it.  Dearest,  dearest ! 
I  shall  be  one  of  those  who  fight  for  the  greatest, 
and  I  promise  you  that  I  shall  not  fail,  that  I  shall 
always  be  faithful  to  myself  and  my  gift.  Nothing 
but  the  best  shall  be  good  enough.  No  compro- 
mise, mother !  When  I  weigh  what  I  have  done  and 
feel  that  it  is  n't  sterling,  or  when  I  hear  that  it's 
got  a  crack  or  a  flaw — into  the  melting-pot  it  goes! 
Every  single  work  must  be  my  best!  Do  you  see 
why  I  have  to  promise?  It 's  my  gratitude  for  my 
riches  that  drives  me  to  make  vows,  and  you  must 
receive  them.  Then  if  I  fail,  it  will  be  a  sin  against 
you,  for  it 's  all  owing  to  you  that  my  soul  is  like 
a  high-vaulted  room — your  dreams  and  longings 
have  given  me  the  impulse  to  growth,  and  your 
sympathies  and  your  unsatisfied  thirst  for  beauty 
have  consecrated  me  to  my  life-work." 

Mrs.  Lyhne  wept  silently.  She  felt  herself  grow- 
ing pale  with  rapture.  Softly  she  laid  both  hands  on 
her  son's  head,  but  he  drew  them  gently  to  his  lips 
and  kissed  them. 

"You  have  made  me  so  happy,  Niels!  Then  my 
life  has  not  been  one  long,  useless  sigh,  if  I  have 
helped  to  lead  you  on  as  I  hoped  and  dreamed  so 
ardently — good  heavens!  how  often  I  havedreamed 
it! — And  yet  there  is  so  much  sadness  mixed  in  my 


CHAPTER  VIII  121 

joy,  Niels!  To  think  that  my  fondest  wish  should 
be  fulfilled,  the  thing  I  have  longed  for  so  many 
years.  .  .  .  Such  things  happen  only  when  life  is  al- 
most done," 

"You  must  n't  talk  like  that,  you  must  n't! 
Why,  everything  is  going  on  well,  and  you  are  get- 
ting stronger  every  day,  mother  dear, are  you  not?" 

"It  is  so  hard  to  die,"  she  said  under  her  breath. 
"  Do  you  know  what  I  was  thinking  of  in  those  long 
sleepless  nights,  when  death  seemed  so  terribly 
near?  I  thought  the  bitterest  of  all  was  to  know  that 
there  were  so  many  great  and  beautiful  things  out 
in  the  world  which  I  should  have  to  leave  behind 
without  ever  having  seen  them.  I  thought  of  the 
thousands  and  thousands  of  souls  they  had  lifted 
up  and  filled  with  life  and  joy,  while  for  me  they 
had  not  existed.  It  seemed  to  me  that  my  soul 
would  fly  away  poverty-stricken  on  feeble  wings, 
without  any  golden  memories  to  carry  with  it  as  a 
reflection  from  the  glories  of  its  homeland,  because 
it  had  only  been  sitting  in  the  chimney-corner 
listening  to  stories  about  the  wonderful  world. — 
Niels,  no  one  can  imagine  what  agony  it  is  to  lie 
imprisoned  in  a  dull,  dark  sick-room  and  struggle, 
in  your  feverish  fancies,  to  call  up  before  you  the 
beauties  of  lands  you  have  never  seen  —  snowy  Al- 
pine peaks  above  blue-black  mountain  lakes,  and 
sparkling  rivers  between  vine-clad  banks,  and  long 
lines  of  mountains  with  ruins  peeping  out  of  the 


122  NIELS  LYHNE 

woods,  and  then  lofty  halls  with  marble  gods  —  and 
never  to  get  it  quite,  but  always  to  give  up  and 
start  over  again,  because  it  seems  so  terribly  hard 
to  leave  it  without  having  had  the  slightest  part  in 
it.  ...  O  God,  Niels,  to  long  for  it  with  your  whole 
soul,  while  you  feel  that  you  are  being  slowly  car- 
ried to  the  threshold  of  another  world,  to  stand  on 
the  threshold  and  look  back  with  a  long,  long  gaze, 
while  all  the  time  you  are  being  forced  through 
that  door  where  none  of  your  longings  have  gone 
before  you.  .  .  .  Niels,  take  me  along  in  your 
thoughts,  dear,  when  the  time  comes  for  you  to 
share  in  all  that  glory  which  I  shall  never,  never 
see! 

She  wept. 

Niels  tried  to  comfort  her.  He  laid  bold  plans 
for  the  journey  they  would  take  together  as  soon 
as  she  was  quite  well.  He  meant  to  go  to  the  city 
to  consult  a  doctor,  and  he  was  sure  the  doctor 
would  agree  with  him  that  it  was  the  best  thing  they 
could  do ;  So-and-so  had  travelled  and  had  recov- 
ered from  his  illness  completely,  simply  through 
the  change;  a  change  often  worked  wonders.  He 
began  to  trace  their  route  in  every  detail,  spoke  of 
how  warmly  he  would  wrap  her  up,  what  short  trips 
they  would  take  at  first,  what  a  delightful  journal 
they  would  keep,  how  they  would  notice  even  the 
smallest  trifles,  how  amusing  it  would  be  to  eat  the 
queerest  things  in  the  loveliest  spots,  and  what 


CHAPTER  VIII  123 

awful  sins  against  grammar  they  would  commit  in 
the  beginning. 

He  went  on  in  this  strain  all  that  evening  and 
on  the  days  that  followed,  never  wearying.  She  en- 
tered into  his  plan  as  into  a  pleasant  fancy,  but  she 
was  plainly  convinced  that  it  would  never  come 
to  pass. 

Nevertheless  Niels,  acting  on  the  doctor's  ad- 
vice, went  on  making  all  the  necessary  preparations 
for  the  trip,  and  she  let  him  do  as  he  pleased,  even 
fix  the  day  of  departure — sure  that  that  would  hap- 
pen which  would  bring  all  his  plans  to  naught.  But 
when,  finally,  there  were  only  a  few  days  left,  and 
when  her  youngest  brother,  who  was  to  manage  the 
farm  in  their  absence,  had  really  arrived,  she  grew 
uncertain,  and  now  it  was  she  who  was  most  eager 
to  be  off,  for  there  still  lurked  in  her  mind  a  fear 
that  the  obstacle  would  leap  out  and  stand  in  their 
way  at  the  very  last  moment. 

So  they  set  off. 

The  first  day  she  was  still  nervous  and  uneasy 
with  a  lingering  trace  of  her  fear,  and  only  when  the 
day  was  happily  ended  could  she  begin  to  grasp  ^ 
the  fact  that  she  was  actually  on  her  way  to  all  the 
glory  she  had  longed  for  so  sorely.  Then  a  feverish 
joy  came  over  her;  her  every  thought  and  word 
was  colored  by  extravagant  anticipation,  and  her 
thoughts  circled  unceasingly  around  what  the  com- 
ing days  would  bring,  one  after  the  other. 


124  NIELS  LYHNE 

And  it  all  came  to  pass,  all  that  she  had  hoped, 
but  it  did  not  fill  her  with  rapture  nor  carry  her 
away  with  the  power  or  the  fervor  she  had  expected. 
She  had  imagined  it  all  different,  and  had  imagined 
herself  different,  too.  In  dreams  and  poems  every- 
thing had  been,  as  it  were,  beyond  the  sea;  the  haze 
of  distance  had  mysteriously  veiled  all  the  restless 
mass  of  details  and  had  thrown  out  the  large  lines 
in  bold  relief,  while  the  silence  of  distance  had  lent 
its  spirit  of  enchantment.  It  had  been  easy  then  to 
feel  the  beauty;  but  now  that  she  was  in  the  midst 
of  it  all,  when  every  little  feature  stood  out  and 
spoke  boldly  with  the  manifold  voices  of  reality, 
and  beauty  was  shattered  as  light  in  a  prism,  she 
could  not  gather  the  rays  together  again,  could 
not  put  the  picture  back  beyond  the  sea.  Despond- 
ently she  was  obliged  to  admit  to  herself  that  she 
felt  poor,  surrounded  by  riches  that  she  could  not 
make  her  own. 

She  yearned  to  go  on  and  ever  on,  still  hoping  to 
find  a  spot  she  might  recognize  as  a  bit  of  the  world 
she  had  dreamed,  that  world  which,  with  every  step 
she  took  to  approach  it,  seemed  to  extinguish  the 
magic  glamor  that  had  suffused  it  and  to  lie  spread 
before  her  disappointed  eyes  in  the  commonplace 
light  of  everybody's  sun  and  everybody's  moon. 
But  she  sought  in  vain,  and  as  the  year  was  already 
far  advanced,  they  hastened  to  Clarens,  where  the 
doctor  had  advised  them  to  spend  the  winter,  and 


CHAPTER  VIII  125 

where,  moreover,  a  last  faintly  gleaming  hope  lured 
the  tired,  dream-wrapped  soul ;  for  was  it  not  the 
Clarens  of  Rousseau,  the  Paradise  of  Julie! 

There  they  remained,  but  it  was  of  no  avail  that 
Winter  made  himself  gentle  and  held  his  cold 
breath  from  touching  her;  against  the  fever  in  her 
blood  he  had  no  healing.  And  Spring,  when  he 
came  on  his  triumphal  march  through  the  valley 
with  the  miracle  of  sprouting  seeds  and  the  gospel 
of  budding  leaves,  he  too  had  to  pass  her  by  and 
let  her  stand  withering  in  the  midst  of  all  this  ex- 
uberant renascence.  The  strength  that  welled  out 
to  her  from  light  and  air  and  earth  and  water  could 
not  be  transformed  to  strength  within  her;  it  could 
not  make  her  blood  drunk  with  health  nor  force  it 
to  sing  exultantly  in  the  great  hymn  to  the  omnipo- 
tence of  Spring.  No,  she  could  but  wither,  for  the 
last  dream  that  had  appeared  before  her  in  the  dim- 
ness of  her  home  as  a  new  reddening  dawn,  the 
dream  of  the  glories  of  the  distant  world,  had  not 
been  followed  by  day.  Its  colors  seemed  paler  the 
nearer  she  came,  and  she  felt  that  they  were  pale  to 
her  because  she  had  longed  for  colors  that  life  does 
not  hold  and  for  a  beauty  that  earth  cannot  ripen. 
But  her  longing  was  not  quenched;  silent  and 
strong  it  burned  in  her  heart,  hotter  in  its  unstilled 
thirst,  hot  and  consuming. 

Round  about  her.  Spring  celebrated  his  feast 
pregnant  with  beauty.  Snowdrops  rang  it  in  with 


126  NIELS  LYHNE 

their  white  bells,  and  crocuses  welcomed  it  joyfully 
holding  up  their  veined  chalices.  Hundreds  of  tiny 
mountain  streams  tumbled  headlong  down  into 
the  valley  to  report  that  Spring  had  come,  but  they 
were  all  too  late,  for  when  they  trickled  between 
green  banks,  primroses  in  yellow  and  violets  in  blue 
stood  there  and  nodded:  We  know  it,  we  know  it; 
we  knew  it  before  you!  The  willows  unfurled  their 
yellow  banners,  and  the  curly  ferns  and  the  velvety 
moss  hung  green  garlands  over  the  naked  walls  of 
the  vineyards,  while  down  below  dry  nettles  hid  the 
stones  with  long  borders  of  brown  and  green  and 
faint  purple.  The  grass  spread  its  mantle  of  green 
far  and  wide,  and  no  end  of  pretty  flowers  sat  down 
upon  it:  there  were  hyacinths  with  blossoms  like 
stars  and  blossoms  like  pearls,  legions  of  daisies, 
gentians,  anemones,  dandelions,  with  a  hundred 
others.  And  high  above  this  bloom  on  the  ground 
there  floated  in  the  air,  borne  up  by  the  hoary 
trunks  of  aged  cherry-trees,  a  thousand  shining 
flower  islands,  where  the  light  foamed  against  white 
shores  dotted  by  blue  and  red  butterflies  bring- 
ing a  message  from  the  flower  continent  below. 

Every  day  brought  new  flowers,  forcing  them  out 
of  the  ground  in  motley  patterns  in  the  gardens  by 
the  sea,  pouring  them  out  over  the  branches  of 
the  trees  down  there  —  paullinias  like  giant  vio- 
lets and  magnolias  like  huge  purple-stained  tulips. 
Along  the  paths  the  flowers  advanced  in  blue  and 


k 


CHAPTER  VIII  127 

white  phalanxes.  They  filled  the  meadows  with  yel- 
low swarms,  but  nowhere  was  there  such  a  maze  of 
bloom  as  in  the  little  sheltered  valleys  up  among 
the  hills,  where  the  larch  stood  with  glittering  ruby 
cones  amidst  pale  green  needles,  for  there  the  nar- 
cissus blossomed  in  dazzling  myriads,  filling  the  air 
far  and  wide  with  the  drowsy  fragrance  from  their 
white  orgies. 

With  all  this  beauty  round  about  her,  she  still  sat 
there  with  the  old  unanswered  longing  for  beauty 
in  her  heart.  It  was  only  now  and  then,  when  the 
sun  sank  behind  the  gentle  slopes  of  Savoy,  and  the 
mountains  beyond  the  sea  seemed  made  of  brown 
opaque  glass,  as  if  their  precipitous  sides  had  drunk 
the  light,  that  nature  could  hold  her  senses  spell- 
bound. Then,  when  the  bright  yellow  mists  of  even- 
ing veiled  the  distant  Jura  Mountains,  and  the  lake, 
Jike  a  copper  mirror  from  which  tongues  of  golden 
^  flame  shot  into  the  red  sunset  glow,  seemed  to  melt 
with  the  sky  into  one  vast,  shining  infinity,  —  then 
it  would  seem,  once  in  a  great  while,  as  though  the 
longing  were  silenced,  and  the  soul  had  found  the 
land  it  sought. 

As  spring  advanced,  her  strength  failed  more 
and  more.  Soon  she  did  not  leave  her  bed,  but 
she  was  no  longer  afraid  of  death ;  she  awaited  it 
eagerly,  for  she  cherished  the  hope  that  beyond  the 
grave  she  would  be  face  to  face  with  all  the  glory, 
be  one  in  soul  with  the  fullness  of  beauty  which  here 


128  NIELS  LYHNE 

on  earth  had  drawn  her  in  hope  and  yearning, — 
a  yearning  which  had  been  clarified  and  transfig- 
ured by  the  increasing  pain  of  long  empty  years  and 
thus  prepared  to  attain  its  goal.  She  dreamed  many 
a  gentle,  wistful  dream  of  how  she  would  return  in 
memory  to  what  earth  had  given  her,  return  from 
the  land  of  immortality,  where  all  the  beauty  of  the 
earth  would  be  always  beyond  the  sea. 

So  she  died,  and  Niels  buried  her  in  the  friendly 
churchyard  at  Clarens,  where  the  brown  vineyard 
mould  covers  the  children  of  so  many  lands,  and 
where  broken  columns  and  veiled  urns  repeat  the 
same  words  of  mourning  in  so  many  languages. 

They  gleam  white  under  dark  cypresses  and 
among  the  winter  bloom  of  the  viburnum;  early 
roses  strew  their  petals  over  many  of  them,  and 
often  the  ground  at  their  base  is  blue  with  violets, 
but  over  every  mound  and  every  stone  creep  the 
glossy-leaved  vines  of  the  gentle  periwinkle,  Rous- 
seau's favorite  flower,  sky  blue  as  never  a  sky  was 
blue. 


Chapter  IX 

NIELS  Lyhne  hurried  home.  He  could  not 
bear  his  loneliness  among  so  many  strangers, 
but  the  nearer  he  came  to  Copenhagen,  the  oftener 
he  asked  himself  what  he  wanted  there,  and  the 
more  he  regretted  that  he  had  not  stayed  abroad. 
For  whom  did  he  have  in  Copenhagen  ?  Not  Frith- 
jof,  and  Erik  was  travelling  in  Italy  on  a  schol- 
arship, so  he  was  not  there.  Mrs.  Boye?  It  was  a 
queer  affair,  this  relation  with  Mrs.  Boye.  Now  that 
he  came  straight  from  his  mother's  grave,  it  seemed 
to  him,  not  exactly  a  desecration  or  anything  like  ^ 
that,  and  yet  out  of  tune  with  the  key  in  which  his(/ 
present  moods  were  pitched.  It  was  a  discord.  If' 
he  had  been  going  to  meet  his  fiancee,  his  young 
blushing  bride,  now  that  his  soul  had  so  long  been 
bent  on  filial  duties,  it  would  not  have  conflicted 
with  his  feeling.  It  was  of  no  use  that  he  tried  to 
take  asuperior  tone  with  himself  and  call  the  change 
in  his  conception  of  his  intimacy  with  Mrs.  Boye 
Philistine  and  provincial.  The  word  "Bohemian" 
formed  itself  subconsciously  as  an  expression  of  a 
distaste  that  he  could  not  reason  away,  and  it  was 
in  line  with  this  mood  that  his  first  visit,  after  he 
had  engaged  his  old  rooms  at  the  embankment, 
was  to  the  Neergaards  and  not  to  Mrs.  Boye. 

The  following  day  he  called  on  her,  but  did  not 
find  her  in.  The  janitor  said  she  had  taken  a  villa 


130  NIELS  LYHNE 

at  Emiliekilde,  which  surprised  Niels,  for  he  knew 
that  her  father's  country  house  was  in  that  neigh- 
borhood. 

Well,  he  would  have  to  go  out  there  in  a  day 
or  two. 

But  the  very  next  day  he  received  a  note  from 
Mrs.  Boye  asking  him  to  meet  her  in  her  apart- 
ment in  town.  The  pale  niece  had  seen  him  in  the 
street.  A  quarter  before  one  he  was  to  come  —  he 
must  come.  She  would  tell  him  why,  if  he  did  not 
know  it.  Did  he  know  it?  He  must  not  misjudge 
her,  and  not  be  unreasonable.  He  knew  her  too 
well,  and  why  should  he  take  it  as  a  plebeian  nature 
would?  He  must  not  —  please!  After  all, they  were 
not  like  other  people.  Oh,  if  he  only  w^^^/^  under- 
stand her!  Niels,  Niels! 

This  letter  made  him  strangely  excited,  and  he 
suddenly  remembered  with  a  sense  of  uneasiness 
that  Mrs.  Neergaard  had  looked  at  him  with  a  sar- 
castic pitying  expression  and  had  smiled  and  said 
nothing  in  a  curious  meaning  way.  What  could  it 
be?  What  in  the  world  could  have  happened? 

The  mood  that  had  kept  him  away  from  Mrs. 
Boye  had  vanished  so  completely  that  he  could  not 
understand  howhe  had  ever  feltit.  He  was  alarmed. 
If  they  had  only  written  to  each  other  like  sen- 
sible people!  Why  had  they  not  written?  He  cer- 
tainly had  not  been  so  busy.  It  was  queer  how  he 
would  allow  himself  to  be  so  absorbed  in  the  place 


CHAPTER  IX  131 

where  he  happened  to  be  that  he  forgot  what  was  far 
away,  or  if  he  did  not  forget  it,  at  least  pushed  it 
into  the  distant  background,  where  it  was  buried  by 
the  present — as  under  mountains.  No  one  would 
think  he  had  imagination. 

At  last!  Mrs.  Boye  herself  opened  the  door  to 
the  ante-room  before  he  had  time  to  ring.  She  said 
nothing,  but  gave  him  her  hand  in  a  long,  sym- 
pathetic clasp;  the  newspapers  had  announced  his 
bereavement.  Niels  said  nothing  either,  and  so  they 
walked  silently  through  the  parlor,  between  the  two 
rows  of  chairs  in  red-striped  covers.  The  chande- 
lier was  wrapped  in  paper,  and  the  window-panes 
were  whitened.  In  the  sitting-room  everything  was 
as  usual,  except  that  the  Venetian  blinds  were  rolled 
down  before  the  opened  windows,  and  as  they  moved 
to  and  fro  in  the  slight  breeze,  they  struck  the  case- 
ment with  a  faint,  monotonous  tapping.  Rays  of 
light  reflected  from  the  sunlit  canal  outside  filtered 
in  between  the  yellow  slats  and  made  squares  of 
tremulous  wavy  lines  in  the  ceiling,  which  quivered 
with  the  rippling  of  the  waves  outside.  Otherwise 
all  was  hushed  and  still,  silently  waiting  with  bated 
breath.  .  .  . 

Mrs.  Boye  could  not  make  up  her  mind  where 
she  wanted  to  sit;  finally  she  decided  on  the  rock- 
ing-chair, and  dusted  it  assiduously  with  her  hand- 
kerchief, but  instead  of  sitting  down  she  stood 
behind  the  chair,  resting  her  hands  on  its  back.  She 


132  NIELS  LYHNE 

still  wore  her  gloves  and  had  only  drawn  one  arm 
out  of  her  half-fitting  black  mantilla.  Her  dress 
was  of  silk  tartan  in  a  very  tiny  check  matching 
the  broad  ribbons  on  the  wide,  round  Pamela  hat 
of  light  straw  which  half  hid  her  face  as  she  stood 
looking  down  and  rocking  the  chair  nervously. 

Niels  seated  himself  on  the  piano-stool  at  a  dis- 
tance from  her,  as  if  he  expected  something  un- 
pleasant. 

"Then  you  know  it,  Niels?" 
/  "No,  but  what  is  it  I  don't  know?" 

The  chair  stopped.  "I  am  engaged." 

"Are  you  engaged?  But  how  —  why — Mrs. 
Boye?" 

"Oh,  don't  call  me  Mrs.  Boye,  and  don't  begin 
to  be  unreasonable  right  away ! "  She  leaned  against 
the  back  of  the  rocking-chair  with  a  little  air  of 
defiance.  "Surely  you  can  understand  that  it  isn't 
the  pleasantest  thing  in  the  world  for  me  to  stand 
here  and  explain  to  you.  I  will  do  it,  but  you  might 
at  least  help  me." 

"What  do  you  mean?  Are  you  engaged,  or  are 
you  not?" 

"I  have  just  told  you  that  I  am,"  she  replied 
with  gentle  impatience,  looking  up. 

"Then  may  I  be  allowed  to  wish  you  joy,  Mrs. 
Boye,  and  to  thank  you  very  much  for  the  time  we 
have  known  each  other."  He  had  risen  to  his  feet 
and  bowed  sarcastically  several  times. 


CHAPTER  IX  133 

"And  you  can  part  from  me  like  this,  quite 
calmly  ?  I  am  engaged,  and  then  we  are  done,  and 
everything  that  has  been  between  us  two  is  just 
a  stupid  old  story  which  must  n't  be  brought  to 
mind  any  more.  Past  is  past,  and  that  is  all  —  Niels, 
all  the  precious  days  —  will  the  memory  of  them  be 
silent  from  now  on  ?  Will  you  never,  never  think 
of  me,  never  miss  me?  Won't  you  call  the  dream 
forth  again,  on  many  a  quiet  evening,  and  give  it 
the  colors  it  might  have  glowed  with  ?  Can  you  keep 
from  loving  it  all  back  to  life  again  in  your  thoughts 
and  ripening  it  to  the  fullness  it  might  have  had? 
Can  you  ?  Can  you  put  your  foot  on  it  and  crush  it 
all  out  of  existence,  every  bit  of  it?  Niels!" 

"I  hope  so;  you  have  shown  me  that  it  can  be 
done. — But  this  is  nonsense,  pure,  unmitigated  non- 
sense from  beginning  to  end.  Why  did  you  arrange 
this  comedy  ?  I  have  no  shadow  of  a  right  to  re- 
proach you.  You  have  never  loved  me,  never  said 
that  you  loved  me.  You  have  given  me  leave  to  love 
you,  that  is  all,  and  now  you  withdraw  your  permis- 
sion. Or  perhaps  you  will  allow  me  to  go  on,  though 
you  have  given  yourself  to  another?  I  don't  under- 
stand you,  if  you  can  imagine  that  to  be  possible. 
We  are  not  children.  Or  are  you  afraid  I  shall  for- 
get you  too  soon?  Never  fear.  You  are  not  one  to 
be  blotted  easily  out  of  a  man's  life.  But  take  care! 
A  love  like  mine  does  not  come  to  a  woman  twice 
in  her  life;  take  care  that  you  do  not  bring  misfor- 


134  NIELS  LYHNE 

tune  upon  yourself  by  casting  me  off!  I  don't  wish 
you  any  harm,  no,  no !  May  you  never  know  want 
and  sickness,  and  may  you  have  all  the  happiness 
that  comes  with  wealth,  admiration,  and  social  suc- 
cess, in  measure  full  and  overflowing,  that  is  my 
wish  for  you.  May  all  the  world  stand  open  to  you, 
all  but  one  little  door,  one  single  little  door,  how- 
ever much  you  knock  and  try  to  open  it — but 
otherwise  everything  as  fully  and  widely  as  it  is 
possible  to  wish  it." 

He  spoke  slowly,  almost  sadly,  not  bitterly,  but 
with  a  strangely  tremulous  note  in  his  voice,  a  note 
that  was  new  to  her  and  moved  her.  She  had  grown 
a  little  pale  and  stood  leaning  stiffly  against  the 
chair. "Niels,"  she  said,"don't  predict  misfortune! 
Remember  you  were  not  here,  Niels,  and  my  love 
—  I  did  not  know  how  real  it  was;  it  seemed  more 
like  something  that  just  interested  me.  It  breathed 
through  my  life  like  a  delicate  spiritual  poem,  it 
never  caught  me  in  strong  arms;  it  had  wings — only 
wings.  At  least  I  thought  so.  I  did  not  know  better 
until  now,  or  until  the  moment  I  had  done  it — 
said  Yes  and  all  that.  Everything  was  so  difficult, 
there  were  so  many  things  all  at  once  and  so  many 
people  to  consider.  ...  It  began  with  my  brother, 
Hardenskjold,  the  one  who  was  in  the  West  Indies, 
you  know.  He  had  been  rather  wild  when  he  was 
here,  but  over  there  he  settled  down  and  became  so 
sensible  and  went  into  partnership  with  some  one 


CHAPTER  IX  135 

and  made  a  lot  of  money,  and  married  a  rich  widow, 
a  sweet  little  thing,  I  assure  you,  and  he  and  father 
made  up,  for  Hardie  was  so  changed,  oh,  he  is  so 
respectable  there  is  no  end  to  it,  and  so  susceptible 
to  what  people  say  —  terribly  bourgeoisie^,  oh!  Of 
course,  he  thought  I  ought  to  be  taken  up  in  the 
bosom  of  the  family  again,  and  every  time  he  came 
here  he  lectured  me  and  pleaded  and  palavered,  and 
you  see  father  is  an  old  man  now,  and  so  at  last  I 
did  it,  and  everything  was  just  as  in  the  old  days." 

She  paused  for  a  moment  and  began  to  take  oif 
first  her  mantilla  and  then  her  hat  and  gloves,  and, 
busy  with  all  this,  she  turned  a  little  away  from 
Niels,  while  she  went  on  talking. 

"And  then  Hardie  had  a  friend  who  is  very 
highly  respected — oh,  extremely  so,  and  they  all 
thought  I  ought  to  do  it  and  wished  it  so  much,  and 
then  you  see  I  could  take  my  position  in  society  . 
just  as  before,  or  really  better  than  before,  because  N 
he  is  so  very  highly  respected  in  every  way,  and 
after  all  that  is  what  I  have  been  wishing  for  a  long 
time.  I  suppose  you  can't  understand  that?  You 
would  never  have  thought  it  of  me  ?  Quite  the  con^-. 
trary.  Because  I  was  always  making  fun  of  conven- 
tional society  with  its  banalities  and  its  stereotyped  , 
morality,  its  thermometer  of  virtue  and  its  compass 
of  womanliness  —  you    remember  how  witty  we 
were !  It  is  to  weep,  Niels,  for  it  was  n't  true,  at  least 
not  all  the  time.  I  will  tell  you  something:  we  wo- 


136  NIELS  LYHNE 

men  can  break  away  for  a  while,  when  something  in 
our  lives  has  opened  our  eyes  to  the  love  of  free- 
dom that  after  all  is  in  us,  but  we  can't  keep  it  up. 
It  is  in  our  blood,  this  passion  for  the  quintessence 
of  propriety  and  the  pinnacle  of  gentility  up  to  its 
most  punctilious  point.  We  can't  bear  to  be  at  war 
with  the  established  order  that  is  accepted  by  all 
commonplace  people.  In  our  inmost  selves  we  really 
think  these  people  are  right,  because  they  are  the 
ones  that  sit  in  judgment,  and  in  our  hearts  we  bow 
to  their  judgments  and  suffer  from  them,  no  mat- 
ter how  brave  a  face  we  wear.  It  is  not  natural  for 
us  women  to  be  exceptional,  not  really,  Niels,  it 
makes  us  so  queer,  more  interesting,  perhaps,  but 
still —  Can  you  understand  it?  It  is  silly,  don't  you 
think  so?  But  at  least  you  can  comprehend  that  it 
made  a  strange  impression  on  me  to  return  to  the 
old  surroundings.  So  many  things  came  back  to  me, 
memories  of  my  mother  and  of  her  standards.  It 
seemed  as  though  I  had  come  into  a  safe  haven 
again ;  everything  was  so  peaceful  and  well  ordered, 
and  I  had  only  to  bind  myself  to  it  to  be  properly 
happy  ever  after.  And  so  I  let  them  bind  me, 
Niels." 

Niels  could  not  help  smiling;  he  felt  so  superior, 
and  was  so  sorry  for  her, as  she  stood  there, girlishly 
unhappy  in  the  midst  of  all  this  confession.  He  was 
softened  and  could  not  find  any  hard  words. 

He  went  over  to  her. 


CHAPTER  IX  137 

Meanwhile  she  had  turned  the  chair  toward  her 
and  had  sunk  down  on  it,  and  now  she  was  sitting 
there  quite  forlorn  and  pathetic,  leaning  back  with 
arms  hanging  and  face  lifted,  gazing  out  under 
lowered  eyelids  through  the  darkened  parlor  with 
its  two  rows  of  chairs  into  the  dim  ante-room. 

Niels  laid  his  arm  along  the  back  of  the  chair 
and  rested  his  hand  on  its  arm,  as  he  bent  over  her. 
"And  you  had  quite  forgotten — me?"  he  whis- 
pered. 

She  seemed  not  to  hear  him  and  did  not  even  lift 
her  eyes,  but  at  last  she  shook  her  head,  very 
faintly,  and,  after  another  long  pause,  shook  it 
again,  very  faintly. 

Round  about  them  everything  was  very  still  at 
first.  Then  a  maid  came  clattering  along  the  halls 
and  singing,  as  she  polished  the  door-locks;  the 
noise  of  the  knobs  turning  cut  brutally  into  the 
silence  and  made  it  seem  deeper  than  before  when 
it  suddenly  came  back.  After  a  while,  nothing  was 
heard  except  the  drowsy,  monotonous  tapping  of 
the  blinds. 

The  silence  seemed  to  rob  them  of  the  power  of 
speech,  almost  of  thought.  She  sat  as  before  with 
her  eyes  fixed  on  the  dim  ante-room,  while  he  re- 
mained standing,  bending  over  her,  gazing  at  the 
pattern  of  her  silk  dress,  and,  unconsciously,  lured 
by  the  enveloping  stillness,  he  began  to  rock  her 
in  the  chair  —  very  —  softly  —  very  —  softly.  .  .  . 


138  NIELS  LYHNE 

She  lifted  her  eyelids  for  a  look  at  his  shadowed 
profile,  and  lowered  them  again  in  quiet  content.  It 
was  like  a  long  embrace ;  it  was  as  though  she  gave 
herself  into  his  arms  when  the  chair  went  back,  and 
when  it  swung  forward  again,  and  her  feet  touched 
the  floor,  there  was  something  of  him  in  the  press- 
ure of  the  boards  against  her  foot.  He  felt  it  too; 
the  process  began  to  interest  him,  and  he  rocked 
more  and  more  vigorously.  It  was  as  though  he 
came  nearer  and  nearer  to  taking  her  as  he  drew 
the  chair  farther  back ;  there  was  anticipation  in  the 
instant  when  it  was  about  to  plunge  forward  again, 
and  when  it  came  down  there  was  a  strange  satis- 
faction in  the  soft  tap  of  her  passive  feet  against 
the  floor;  then  when  he  pushed  it  down  yet  a  little 
farther  there  was  complete  possession  in  the  action 
which  pressed  her  sole  gently  against  the  floor  and 
forced  her  to  raise  her  knee  ever  so  slightly. 

"Let  us  not  dream!"  said  Niels  at  last  with  a 
sigh  and  relinquished  the  chair. 

"Yes,  let  us!"  she  said  almost  pleadingly,  and 
looked  innocently  at  him  with  great  wistful  eyes. 

She  had  risen  slowly. 

"  No  dreams ! "  said  Niels  nervously,  putting  his 
arm  around  her  waist.  "Too  many  dreams  have 
passed  between  you  and  me.  Have  you  never  felt 
them?  Have  they  never  touched  you  like  a  light 
breath  caressing  your  cheek  or  stirring  your  hair? 
Is  it  possible  that  the  night  has  never  been  trem- 


CHAPTER  IX  139 

ulous  with  sigh  upon  sigh  that  dropped  and  died 
on  your  lips?" 

He  kissed  her,  and  it  seemed  to  him  that  she 
grew  less  young  under  his  kisses,  less  young,  but 
lovelier,  more  glowing  in  her  beauty,  more  alluring. 

"I  want  you  to  know  it,"  he  said.  "You  don't 
know  how  I  love  you,  how  I  have  suffered  and 
longed.  Oh,  if  those  rooms  at  the  embankment 
could  speak,  Tema!" 

He  kissed  her  again  and  again,  and  she  threw 
her  arms  around  his  neck  with  such  abandon  that 
her  wide  silk  sleeves  fell  back  above  the  billowing 
laceof  the  white  undersleeves,  above  the  gray  elastic 
that  held  them  together  over  the  elbow. 

"What  could  those  rooms  say,  Niels?" 

"Tema,  they  could  say,  ten  thousand  times  and 
more;  they  could  pray  in  that  name,  rage  in  that 
name,  sigh  and  sob  in  it;  they  could  threaten  Tema, 
too." 

"Could  they?" 

From  the  street  below  came  a  conversation  float- 
ing in  through  the  open  window  complete  and  un- 
abridged, the  most  commonplace  worldly  wisdom 
drawled  in  shopworn  phrases,  welded  together  by 
two  untemperamental, gossipy  voices.  All  this  prose 
made  it  more  wonderful  yet  to  stand  there,  heart  to 
heart,  sheltered  in  the  soft,  dim  light. 

"How  I  love  you,  sweetheart,  sweetheart  —  in 
my  arms  you  are  so  dear;  are  you  so  dear,  so  dear? 


I40  NIELS  LYHNE 

And  your  hair — 1  can  hardly  speak,  and  all  my 
memories  —  so  dear  —  all  my  memories  of  how  I 
cried  and  was  wretched  and  longed  so  miserably, 
they  press  on  and  force  their  way  in  as  if  they  too 
would  be  happy  with  me  in  my  happiness  —  do 
you  understand?  —  Do  you  remember,  Tema,  the 
moonlight  last  year?  Are  you  fond  of  it?  —  Oh,  you 
don't  know  how  cruel  it  can  be.  Such  a  clear,  moon- 
light night,  when  the  air  seems  to  have  stiffened  in 
cold  light,  and  the  clouds  lie  there  in  long  layers 
—  Tema,  flowers  and  leaves  hold  their  fragrance 
so  close  around  them  it  is  like  a  frost  of  scents  cov- 
ering them,  and  all  sounds  seem  so  far  away  and 
die  so  suddenly  and  do  not  linger  at  all  —  Such 
a  night  is  so  merciless,  for  it  makes  longing  grow 
so  strangely  intense;  the  silence  draws  it  out  from 
every  corner  of  your  soul,  sucks  it  out  with  hard 
lips,  and  there  is  no  glimmering  hope,  no  slum- 
bering promise  in  all  that  clearness.  Oh,  how  I 
cried,  Tema!  Tema,  have  you  never  cried  through 
a  moonlight  night?  Sweetheart,  it  would  be  a  shame 
if  you  should  cry;  you  shall  never  cry,  there  shall 
always  be  sunshine  for  you  and  nights  of  roses  — 
a  night  of  roses  —  " 

She  had  given  herself  entirely  to  his  embrace, 
and  with  her  gaze  lost  in  his,  her  lips  murmured 
strangely  sweet  words  of  love,  half  muted  by  her 
breath,  words  repeated  after  him,  as  if  she  were 
whispering  them  to  her  own  heart. 


CHAPTER  IX  141 

The  cessation  of  the  voices  in  the  street  made 
her  stir  restlessly.  Then  they  came  back  to  the  firm, 
rhythmic  accompaniment  of  a  cane  striking  against 
the  cobble-stones,  crossed  over  to  the  other  side, 
lingered  long  in  the  distance,  sank  to  a  murmur  — 
died  away. 

And  the  silence  again  welled  up  around  them, 
flamed  up  around  them,  throbbing  with  heartbeats, 
heavy  with  breath, yielding.  Speech  had  been  seared 
away  between  them,  and  lingering  kisses  fell  from 
their  lips  fraught  with  unspoken  questions,  but  giv- 
ing no  solace  nor  any  present  bliss.  They  held  each 
other's  gaze  and  dared  not  take  their  eyes  away, 
but  neither  did  they  dare  to  put  meaning  into  their 
look;  they  veiled  it  rather;  withdrew  behind  it, 
silently  hiding,  brooding  over  secret  dreams. 

A  quiver  passed  through  his  clasping  arms  and 
woke  her.  She  thrust  him  from  her  with  both  hands 
and  set  herself  free. 

"  Go,  Niels,  go !  You  must  not  be  here,  you  must 
not.  Do  you  hear.^" 

He  tried  to  draw  her  to  him  again,  but  she  broke 
away,  wild  and  pale.  She  was  trembling  from  head 
to  foot  and  stood  holding  her  arms  ou4:  from  her 
body  as  if  she  were  afraid  to  touch  herself. 

Niels  would  have  knelt  and  caught  her  hand. 

"Don't  touch  me!"  There  was  desperation  in 
her  look.  "  Why  don't  you  go  when  I  am  begging 
you  to?  Good  heavens,  why  can't  you  go?  No,  no, 


142  NIELS  LYHNE 

don't  speak  to  me,  go  away,  you  —  Can't  you  see 
I  am  shaking  before  you?  Look,  look!  Oh,  it's 
wicked  the  way  you  are  treating  me !  And  when 
I'm  begging  you  to  go!" 

It  was  impossible  to  say  a  word;  she  would  not 
listen.  She  was  quite  beside  herself.  Tears  streamed 
from  her  eyes;  her  face  was  almost  distorted  and 
seemed  to  give  out  light  in  its  pallor. 

"Oh,  do  go!  Can't  you  see  that  you  are  humil- 
iating me  by  staying?  You  are  brutal  to  me,  that's 
what  you  are!  What  have  I  done  to  you  that  you 
ill-treat  me  this  way?  Do  go!  Have  you  no  pity?" 

Pity  ?  He  was  cold  with  rage.  This  was  madness! 
Still  he  could  do  nothing  but  go,  and  he  went. 
He  did  not  like  the  two  rows  of  chairs,  but  he 
walked  slowly  between  them,  looking  at  them  with 
a  fixed  gaze  of  defiance. 

"  Exit  Niels  Lyhne,"  he  said,  when  he  heard  the 
latch  of  the  hall-door  click  behind  him. 

He  walked  down  the  steps  thoughtfully,  his  hat 
in  his  hand.  On  the  landing  he  stopped  and  ges- 
ticulated to  himself:  If  he  could  understand  the 
least  bit!  Why  this  and  why,  again,  that?  Then  he 
walked  on.  There  were  the  open  windows.  He  felt 
like  tearing  to  pieces  that  sickly  sweet  silence  up 
there  with  a  shrill  cry.  He  felt  like  talking  to  some 
one  for  hours  —  mercilessly — talking  nonsense  into 
that  silence,  washing  it  cold  in  nonsense.  He  could 
not  get  it  out  of  his  blood  ;  he  could  see  it,  taste  it; 


CHAPTER  IX  143 

he  walked  in  it.  Suddenly  he  stopped  and  blushed 
fiery  red  with  angry  shame.  Had  she  used  him  to 
tempt  herself  with? 

In  the  room  above,  Mrs.  Boye  still  was  weep- 
ing. She  had  gone  over  to  the  pier-glass  and  stood 
resting  both  hands  on  the  console,  weeping  till  the 
tears  dripped  from  her  cheeks  down  into  the  pink 
chamber  of  a  huge  sea-shell  lying  there.  She  looked 
at  her  distorted  face  as  it  appeared  above  the  misty 
spot  her  breath  had  formed  on  the  mirror,  and 
traced  the  course  of  her  tears  as  they  welled  out 
over  the  rim  of  the  eyes  and  rolled  down.  Where 
did  they  all  come  from?  She  had  never  cried  like 
this  before — yes,  once,  in  Frascati,  after  a  runaway. 

Presently  the  tears  began  to  come  more  spar- 
ingly, but  a  nervous  trembling  still  shook  her  spas- 
modically from  neck  to  heel. 

The  sun  now  beat  directly  on  the  windows.  The 
tremulous  reflections  from  the  waves  were  drawn 
aslant  under  the  ceiling,  and  on  the  sides  of  the 
Venetian  blinds  the  parallel  rays  fell  in  rows,  form- 
ing perfect  shelves  of  yellowish  light.  The  heat  in- 
creased, and  mingling  with  the  ripe  smell  of  hot 
wood  and  sun-warmed  dust,  other  scents  floated  out 
from  the  bright  flowers  of  the  sofa-cushions,  from 
the  silken  curves  of  the  chair-backs,  from  books 
and  folded  rugs,  where  the  heat  released  a  hundred 
forgotten  perfumes  and  wafted  them  through  the 
air,  light  as  wraiths. 


144  NIELS  LYHNE 

Very  slowly  her  trembling  subsided,  leaving  a 
curious  dizziness,  in  which  fantastic  emotions  that 
were  more  than  half  sensations  whirled  around  on 
the  tracks  of  her  wondering  thoughts.  She  closed  her 
eyes,  but  remained  standing  with  her  face  turned  to 
the  mirror. 

Strange  how  it  had  come  over  her,  this  piercing 
terror!  Had  she  cried  out?  There  was  the  echo  of 
a  scream  in  her  ears  and  a  tired  feeling  in  her  throat 
as  if  she  had  emitted  a  long,  anguished  cry.  If  he 
had  taken  her!  She  allowed  herself  to  be  taken  and 
pressed  her  arms  against  her  heart  as  if  to  ward  him 
off.  She  struggled,  but  yet — now:  she  felt  as  if  she 
were  sinking  naked  through  the  air,blushing,  burn- 
ing with  shame,  impudently  caressed  by  all  the  winds 
of  heaven — He  would  not  go,  and  it  would  soon 
be  too  late;  all  her  strength  was  leaving  her  like 
bubbles  that  burst;  bubble  after  bubble  forced  its 
way  between  her  lips  and  burst  unceasingly;  in  an- 
other second  it  would  be  too  late !  Had  she  begged 
him  on  her  knees?  Too  late!  She  was  lifted  irre- 
sistibly to  his  embrace,  as  a  bubble  that  rises  through 
the  water — tremulous,  so  her  soul  rose  up  naked 
before  him,  with  every  wish  bared  to  his  gaze,  every 
secret  dream,  every  hidden  surrender  unveiled  be- 
fore his  mastering  eye.  Again  in  his  arms,  linger- 
ing, sweetly  trembling.  There  was  a  statue  of  ala- 
baster surrounded  by  flames;  it  glowed  transparent 


CHAPTER  IX  145 

In  the  heat  of  the  fire;  little  by  little  its  dark  cen- 
tre melted,  until  all  was  luminous  light. 

Slowly  she  opened  her  eyes  and  looked  at  her 
image  in  the  mirror  with  a  discreet  smile  as  at  a 
fellow  conspirator  before  whom  she  did  not  wish 
to  commit  herself  too  fully.  Then  she  went  around 
the  room  gathering  together  her  gloves,  hat,  and 
mantilla. 

Her  dizziness  seemed  blown  away,  leaving  only 
a  rather  pleasant  sense  of  weakness  in  her  knees. 
She  walked  about  to  feel  it  better.  Secretly,  as  if  by 
accident,  she  gave  the  rocking-chair  a  confidential 
little  push  with  her  elbow. 

She  rather  liked  scenes.  ^  -. 

With  one  look  she  said  farewell  to  some  invis- 
ible thing.  Then  she  rolled  up  the  blinds,  and  it 
seemed  like  another  room. 

Three  weeks  later  Mrs.  Boye  was  married,  and 
Niels  Lyhne  was  quite  alone  with  himself.  Hecould 
not  quite  keep  up  his  indignation  over  the  un- 
worthy manner  in  which  she  had  thrown  herself 
into  the  arms  of  that  conventional  society  at  which 
she  had  so  often  scofi^ed.  True,  it  had  only  opened 
the  door  and  beckoned,  and  she  had  come.  But  it 
was  hardly  for  him  to  throw  stones,  for  had  he  not 
himself  felt  the  magnetic  attraction  of  honest  bour- 
geoisie? If  it  had  not  been  for  that  last  meeting! 


146  NIELS  LYHNE 

If  that  really  was  what  he  accused  her  of,  if  it  had 
been  intended  for  a  madcap  farewell  to  the  old  life, 
one  last  wanton  prank  before  she  withdrew  behind 
"the  quintessence  of  propriety  "  —  could  it  be  pos- 
sible? Such  boundless  self-scorn,  such  a  cynical 
mockery  of  herself  and  him  and  all  that  they  had 
shared  of  memories  and  hopes,  of  enthusiasm  and 
sacred  ideals !  It  made  him  blush  and  rage  by  turns. 
—  But  was  he  fair  to  her?  After  all,  what  had  she 
done  but  tell  him  frankly  and  honestly:  Such  and 
such  things  draw  me  to  the  other  side  and  draw 
me  powerfully,  but  I  recognize  your  right  even 
more  fully  than  you  ask,  and  here  I  am.  If  you  can 
take  me,  I  am  yours;  if  not,  I  go  where  the  power 
is  greatest.  —  And  if  it  were  so,  had  she  not  been 
entirely  within  her  rights?  He  had  not  been  able 
to  take  her.  The  final  decision  might  depend  on 
such  a  little  thing,  on  the  shadow  of  a  thought,  the 
vibration  of  a  mood. 

If  he  only  knew  what  she  must  have  known  for 
an  instant  and  probably  did  not  know  any  longer! 
He  hated  to  believe  that  of  which  he  could  not 
help  accusing  her.  Not  only  for  her  sake,  but  even 
more  for  his  own,  because  it  seemed  to  put  a  blot 
on  his'scutcheon,  not  logically,  of  course,  and  yet  — 

But,  whatever  the  manner  of  her  leaving  him, 
one  thing  was  certain:  he  was  nowalone,and  though 
he  felt  the  emptiness  at  first,  he  was  soon  con- 
scious of  a  sense  of  relief.  So  many  things  were  wait- 


CHAPTER  IX  147 

ing  for  him.  The  year  at  Lonborggaard  and  abroad, 
though  absorbing  his  thoughts,  had  been  in  a  sense 
an  involuntary  rest,  and  the  very  fact  that  this 
period  had  given  him  a  clearer  conception  of  his 
own  powers  and  limitations  spurred  him  on  ta^ 
use  his  faculties  in  undisturbed  work.  He  was  not 
anxious  to  create  yet,  but  rather  to  collect;  there  / 
was  such  an  infinite  mass  of  material  he  wanted  to 
make  his  own  that  he  began  to  think  dejectedly  of 
the  brief  span  of  mortal  life.  Though  he  had  never 
wasted  his  time,  it  is  not  easy  to  emancipate  one's 
self  from  the  paternal  book-case,  and  it  seems  sim- 
plest to  seek  the  goal  along  the  paths  where  others 
have  attained  it,  and  therefore  he  had  not  set  out 
toseek  hisown  Vineland  in  thewideworldof  books, 
but  had  followed  where  the  fathers  led.  Loyally 
he  had  closed  his  eyes  to  much  that  lured  him,  in 
order  to  see  more  clearly  in  the  vast  night  of  the 
Eddas  and  sagas;  and  he  had  been  deaf  to  many 
voices  that  called  him,  in  order  to  listen  more  closely 
to  the  mystic  sounds  of  nature  in  the  folksongs. 
But  now  he  understood,  at  last,  that  it  was  not 
a  law  of  nature  to  be  either  Old  Norse  or  Romantic, 
that  it  was  simpler  to  express  his  own  doubts  than 
to  put  them  in  the  mouth  of  Gorm,  Loki-worship- 
per,  that  it  was  more  rational  to  find  words  for  the 
mystic  stirrings  of  his  own  being  than  to  call  to 
the  cloister  walls  of  the  Middle  Ages  and  hear  his 
own  voice  come  back  to  him  as  a  faint  echo. 


148  NIELS  LYHNE 

He  had  always  had  an  open  mind  for  the  new 
ideas  of  his  time,  but  he  had  been  occupied  in  find- 
ing how  the  New  had  been  foreshadowed  in  the 
Old,  rather  than  in  listening  to  what  the  New  said 
clearly  and  explicitly  for  itself.  In  this  he  was  in  no 
wise  remarkable;  for  never  yet  has  any  new  gospel 
been  preached  but  the  whole  world  has  become 
busy  with  the  old  prophets. 

Yet  this  did  not  suffice,  and  Niels  threw  himself 
enthusiastically  into  his  new  labors.  He  was  seized 
with  that  lust  of  conquest  and  thirst  for  the  power 
of  knowledge  which  every  worker  in  the  realm  of 
thought,  no  matter  how  humble  a  drudge  he  may 
later  become,  has  surely  felt  once  in  his  life,  though 
for  only  one  brief  hour.  Which  one  of  us  all,  whom 
a  kind  fate  has  given  the  opportunity  to  care  for  the 
development  of  our  own  minds,  has  not  gazed  rap- 
turously out  over  the  boundless  sea  of  knowledge, 
and  which  of  us  has  not  gone  down  to  its  clear,  cool 
waters  and  begun,  in  the  light-hearted  arrogance 
of  youth,  to  dip  it  out  in  our  hollow  hand  as  the 
child  in  the  legend?  Do  you  remember  how  the 
sun  could  laugh  over  the  fair  summer  land,  yet  you 
saw  neither  flower  nor  sky  nor  rippling  brook  ?  The 
feasts  of  life  swept  past  and  woke  not  even  a  dream 
in  your  young  blood;  even  your  home  .^eemed  far 
away — do  you  remember?  And  do  you  also  re- 
member how  a  structure  rose  in  your  thoughts  from 
the  yellowing  leaves  of  books,  complete  and  whole. 


CHAPTER  IX  149 

reposing  in  itself  as  a  work  of  art,  and  it  was 
yours  in  every  detail,  and  your  spirit  dwelt  in  it? 
When  the  pillars  rose  slender  and  with  conscious 
strength  in  their  bold  curves,  it  was  of  you  that 
brave  aspiring  and  of  you  the  bold  sustaining.  And 
when  the  vaulted  roof  seemed  to  be  suspended  in  air, 
because  it  had  gathered  all  its  weight,  stone  upon 
stone,  in  mighty  drops,  and  let  it  down  on  the  neck 
of  the  pillars,  it  was  of  you  that  dream  of  weight- 
less floating,  that  confident  bearing  down  of  the 
arches;  it  was  you  planting  your  foot  on  your  own. 
In  this  wise  your  personality  grows  with  your 
knowledge  and  is  clarified  and  unified  through  it. 
To  learn  is  as  beautiful  as  to  live.  Do  not  be  afraid 
to  lose  yourself  in  minds  greater  than  your  own ! 
Do  not  sit  brooding  anxiously  over  your  own  indi- 
viduality or  shut  yourself  out  from  influences  that 
draw  you  powerfully  for  fear  that  they  may  sweep 
you  along  and  submerge  your  innermost  pet  pe- 
culiarities in  their  mighty  surge!  Never  fear!  The 
individuality  that  can  be  lost  in  the  sifting  and  re- 
shaping of  a  healthy  development  is  only  a  flaw; 
it  is  a  branch  grown  in  the  dark,  which  is  distinctive 
only  so  long  as  it  retains  its  sickly  pallor.  And  it  is 
by  the  sound  growth  in  yourself  that  you  must  live. 
Only  the  sound  can  grow  great. 

Christmas  Eve  came  upon  Niels  Lyhne  unawares. 
For  the  past  six  months,  he  had  not  visited  any 


~~7 


150  NIELS  LYHNE 

one  except  now  and  then  the  Neergaards.  They 
had  invited  him  to  spend  the  evening  with  them, 
but  last  Christmas  Eve  had  been  the  memorable 
one  at  Clarens,  and  therefore  he  preferred  to  be 
alone. 

There  was  a  high  wind.  A  thin  covering  of  snow 
not  yet  trodden  into  slush  spread  over  the  streets 
and  made  them  seem  wider.  The  layer  of  white  on 
roofs  and  window-sills  gave  a  touch  of  beauty  to 
the  houses  at  the  same  time  as  it  made  them  appear 
more  isolated.  The  street-lamps,  flickering  in  the 
wind,  would  now  and  then,  as  if  absent-mindedly, 
send  a  patch  of  light  up  a  wall  and  startle  from  its 
dreams  a  merchant*s  sign,  making  it  stare  out  in 
large-lettered  blankness.  The  store-windows,  too, 
half  lighted  as  they  were  and  still  disarranged  from 
the  Christmas  shopping,  wore  an  unusual  aspect, 
a  curiously  abstracted  look. 

He  turned  into  the  side  streets,  where  the  cele- 
bration seemed  to  be  in  full  swing.  Music  sounded 
from  basements  and  low  rooms;  sometimes  it  was 
a  violin,  but  more  often  a  hand  organ,  that  droned 
out  dance  tunes,  and  something  in  the  hearty  good- 
will of  the  performers  suggested  rather  the  pleasant 
toil  of  the  dance  than  its  festive  glamor.  It  brought 
an  illusion  of  shuffling  feet  and  steaming  air — at 
least  so  it  seemed  to  him  who  stood  outside  and, 
in  his  solitude,  became  polemical  against  all  this 
sociability.  He  had  much  more  sympathy  for  the 


CHAPTER  IX  151 

workingman  who  stood  with  his  child  outside  a  tiny- 
shop,  discussing  one  of  the  cheap  marvels  in  the 
dimly  lighted  window,  evidently  determined  to  have 
their  choice  absolutely  decided  before  they  ventured 
into  that  den  of  temptation.  And  he  felt  sympathy 
for  the  poorly  clad  old  gentlewomen  who  passed 
him,  one  by  one,  almost  at  every  hundred  steps — 
all  with  the  strangest  coats  and  mantillas  in  the 
fashion  of  bygone  days,  and  all  with  diffident,  timo- 
rous movements  of  their  old  throats,  like  suspicious 
birds,  walking  in  the  uncertain,  hesitating  manner 
of  those  long  unused  to  the  world,  as  if  they  had 
been  sitting,  day  after  day,  forgotten  in  the  hidden 
corners  of  rear  flats  and  attic  rooms  and  only  that 
one  evening  in  the  year  were  included  and  remem- 
bered. Itsaddened  him.  His  heart  shrank  withasick 
sensation, as  he  tried  to  picture  to  himselfthe  slowly 
trickling  existence  of  such  a  lonely  old  spinster;  he 
seemed  to  hear  sounding  in  his  ears  a  mantel  clock, 
painfully  rhythmic,  ticking  out  its  '"once-again, 
once-again,''  dropping  the  empty  seconds,  one  by 
one,  in  the  chalice  of  day  and  filling  it  full. 

Well,  he  would  have  to  get  this  Christmas  dinner 
over  with.  He  retraced  his  steps  in  a  half  conscious 
dread  that  if  he  chose  other  streets  they  might 
reveal  other  kinds  of  lonely  creatures  and  other 
forms  of  forlornness  than  those  he  had  encoun- 
tered, which  had  already  left  a  bitter  taste  in  his 
mouth. 


152  NIELS  LYHNE 

Out  there  in  the  wider  streets  he  breathed  more 
freely.  He  quickened  his  pace  with  a  sHght  sense  of 
defiance,  holding  himself  apart  as  it  were  from  what 
he  had  just  seen  by  telling  himself  that  his  loneli- 
ness was  self-chosen. 

He  entered  one  of  the  larger  restaurants.  While 
waiting  for  his  dinner,  he  observed,  from  the  shel- 
ter of  an  old  newspaper  supplement,  the  people 
who  came  in.  Most  of  them  were  young  men.  Some 
had  a  challenging  air,  as  if  they  would  forbid  all  pres- 
ent to  appropriate  them  as  fellow  sufferers,  while 
others  could  not  conceal  their  embarrassment  at 
having  no  place  to  go  on  such  an  evening,  but  all 
showed  a  marked  preference  for  distant  corners  and 
secluded  tables.  Many  came  in  couples,  and  most 
of  these  were  plainly  brothers;  Niels  had  never 
seen  so  many  brothers  all  at  once.  Often  they  were 
very  much  unlike  each  other  in  dress  and  manner, 
and  their  hands  testified  even  more  clearly  to  their 
different  positions  in  life.  It  was  almost  a  rarity  to 
see  any  particular  intimacy  between  them,  either 
when  they  came  or  after  they  had  sat  and  talked 
for  a  while.  Here,  one  was  superior  and  the  other 
full  of  admiration;  there,  one  was  cordial,  while  the 
other  repelled  advances.  Others  again  betrayed  a 
mutual  watchfulness,  or,  worse  yet,  an  unexpressed 
condemnation  of  each  other's  aims  and  ambitions 
and  methods.  Most  of  them  evidently  needed  the 
holiday  and  a  certain  amount  of  loneliness  to  make 


CHAPTER  IX  153 

them  remember  their  common  origin  and  bring 
them  together. 

Niels  sat  thinking  of  this  and  marvelling  at  the 
patience  all  these  people  exhibited,  neither  ring- 
ing nor  calling  for  the  waiters,  as  if  they  had  tacitly 
agreed  to  banish  as  much  as  possible  of  the  restau- 
rant atmosphere  from  the  place.  While  he  was  en- 
grossed in  this,  he  saw  just  coming  in  a  man  whom 
he  knew,  and  the  sudden  sight  of  a  familiar  face 
among  all  these  strangers  startled  him  so  that  he 
rose  and  met  him  with  a  pleased,  though  somewhat 
surprised,  "Good  evening." 

"  Are  you  waiting  for  any  one?  "  asked  the  other, 
looking  for  a  place  to  hang  his  overcoat. 

"  No,  I  am  alone." 

"That 's  lucky  for  me ! " 

The  newcomer  was  a  Dr.  Hjerrild,  a  young  man 
whom  Niels  had  met  at  the  Neergaards,  and  whom 
he  knew —  not  from  anything  he  had  said,  butfrom 
certain  innuendos  of  Mrs.Neergaard's  —  to  be  very 
liberal  in  his  religious  views,  though  the  political 
opinions  he  professed  were  quite  the  reverse.  People 
of  that  type  did  not  often  frequent  the  home  of  the , 
Neergaards,  who  were  at  once  religious  and  liberal. 
The  doctor,  however,  belonged  by  inclination  as 
well  as  through  the  influence  of  his  dead  mother  to 
one  of  the  circles  —  rather  numerous  at  that  time  — 
where  the  new  liberal  ideas  were  looked  on  with 
sceptical  or  even  hostile  eyes,  while  in  religion  their 


154  NIELS  LYHNE 

members  were  rather  more  than  rationalists  and 
rather  less  than  atheists,  when  they  were  not  mystics 
or  indifFerentists.  These  various  circles  had  many 
shades  of  opinion,  but,  in  general,  they  were  agreed 
in  feeling  that  Holstein  was  at  least  as  near  to  their 
hearts  as  Slesvig,  while  the  kinship  with  Sweden  was 
ignored,  and  Danism  in  its  newest  forms  was  not 
altogether  approved.  Moreover,  they  knew  their 
Moliere  better  than  their  Holberg,  Baggesen  bet- 
ter than  Oehlenschlager,  and  in  their  artistic  taste 
they  tended,  perhaps,  to  the  sentimental. 

In  such,  or  at  least  kindred  influences,  Hjerrild 
had  developed.  He  sat  looking  a  little  dubiously 
at  Niels,  as  the  latter  recounted  his  observations 
of  the  other  diners  and  especially  dwelt  on  their 
apparent  shame  at  not  having  part  in  any  home  or 
semblance  of  home  on  such  an  evening. 

"I  understand  that  perfectly,"  he  said  coldly,  in 
atone  almost  of  rebuff.  "People  don't  come  here 
on  Christmas  Eve  because  they  like  it,  and  neces- 
sarily they  must  have  a  sense  of  humiliation  at 
being  left  out,  no  matter  whether  it 's  other  people's 
doingor  theirown.  Do  you  mindtellingmewhy  you 
are  here?  Don't  answer  if  you  would  rather  not." 

Niels  replied  that  it  was  only  because  he  had 
spent  last  Christmas  Eve  with  his  mothej*,  who  had 
since  died. 

"  I  beg  your  pardon,"  said  Hjerrild ;  "itwas  very 
good  of  you  to  answer  me,  and  you  must  forgive 


CHAPTER  IX  155 

me  for  being  so  suspicious.  Do  you  know,  I  could 
very  well  imagine  that  you  might  come  here  in 
order  to  administer  a  youthful  kick  to  Christmas  as 
an  institution,  but  as  for  myself,  I  am  really  here 
out  of  respect  for  other  people's  Christmas.  It  is 
the  first  Christmas  Eve  since  I  came  here  that  I 
have  not  spent  with  a  very  kind  family  from  my  na- 
tive town.  It  occurred  to  me,  somehow,  that  I  was 
in  the  way  when  they  sang  their  Christmas  carols, 
not  that  they  were  ashamed  —  they  have  too  much 
character  for  that — but  it  made  them  uneasy  to 
have  any  one  there  to  whom  these  hymns  were  as 
sung  into  the  empty  air.  At  least  that  is  what  I  im- 
agined." 

Almostsilently  they  finished  their  dinner,  lighted 
their  cigars,  and  agreed  to  go  somewhere  else  for 
their  toddy.  Neither  of  them  felt  inclined,  that 
evening,  to  gaze  upon  the  same  gilded  mirror 
frames  and  red  sofas  that  met  their  eyes  on  most  of 
the  other  evenings  of  the  year,  and  so  they  sought 
refuge  in  a  little  cafe  which  they  did  not  usually 
frequent. 

They  soon  realized  that  this  was  no  place  to 
stay  in. 

The  host  and  the  waiters,  with  a  few  friends, 
sat  in  the  rear  of  the  room,  playing  loo  with  two 
trumps.  The  host's  wife  and  daughters  looked  on 
and  brought  the  refreshments,  but  not  to  the 
strangers;  a  waiter  filled  their  order.  They  drank 


156  NIELS  LYHNE 

hurriedly,  for  they  noticed  that  their  entrance  made 
an  interruption;  the  conversation  was  hushed,  and 
the  host,  who  had  been  sitting  in  his  shirt-sleeves, 
seemed  embarrassed  and  put  on  his  coat. 

"  We  seem  to  be  rather  homeless  to-night,*'  said 
Niels,  as  they  walked  down  the  street. 

"Well,  that  is  as  it  should  be,"  was  Hjerrild's 
rather  pathetic  answer. 

They  began  to  talk  about  the  Christian  religion, 
for  the  topic  was  in  the  air. 

Niels  argued  vehemently,  but  in  rather  general 
terms,  against  Christianity. 

Hjerrild  was  tired  of  treading  again  the  beaten 
track  of  discussions  that  were  old  to  him,  and  sud- 
denly said,  without  any  particular  connection  with 
what  had  gone  before:  "Take  care,  Lyhne;  Chris- 
tianity is  in  power.  It  is  foolish  to  quarrel  with 
the  reigning  truth  by  agitating  for  a  crown  prince 
truth." 

"  Foolish  or  not  foolish  —  what  does  it  matter? " 

"Don't  say  that  so  lightly.  I  did  not  mean  to  tell 
you  such  a  commonplace  as  that  it  is  foolish  in  a 
material  way;  morally,  too,  it  is  foolish  and  worse. 
Take  care ;  don't  associate  yourself  too  closely  with 
this  particular  movement  in  our  time,  unless  it 
happens  to  be  absolutely  necessary  to  your  own 
personality.  As  a  poet  you  must  have  many  other 
interests." 

"I  don't  understand  you.  I  can't  treat  myself 


CHAPTER  IX  157 

like  a  hurdy-gurdy  from  which  I  can  take  out  an 
unpopular  piece  and  put  in  a  tune  that  everybody 
is  whisthng." 

"Can't  you?  Many  people  can.  But  you  can  at 
least  say:  'We  are  not  playing  that  piece  just  now/ 
We  can  often  do  more  in  that  line  than  we  think. 
A  human  being  is  not  so  closely  knit.  When  you  use 
your  right  arm  constantly  in  violent  exertion,  the 
blood  rushes  to  it,  and  it  grows  at  the  expense  of 
the  rest  of  your  body,  while  your  legs,  which  you 
are  using  as  little  as  possible,  naturally  get  a  little 
thin.  You  can  apply  the  image  for  yourself  Have 
you  noticed  that  most  of  the  idealistic  forces  in 
our  country,  and  probably  the  best  of  them,  are 
entirely  absorbed  in  the  cause  of  political  freedom? 
You  can  take  a  lesson  from  that.  Believe  me,  there 
is  saving  grace  in  fighting  for  an  idea  that  is  gain- 
ing ground,  but  it  is  very  demoralizing  to  a  man  to 
belong  to  a  losing  minority,  which  life,  in  its  inev- 
itable course,  puts  in  the  wrong,  point  by  point, 
step  by  step.  It  cannot  be  otherwise,  for  it  is  bit- 
terly disheartening  to  see  that  which  your  inmost 
soul  believes  to  be  right  and  true,  to  see  this  Truth 
reviled  and  struck  in  the  face  by  the  meanest  camp- 
follower  in  the  victorious  army,  to  hear  her  called 
vile  names,  while  you  can  do  nothing  at  all  except 
to  love  her  even  more  faithfully,  kneel  to  her  in 
your  heart  with  even  deeper  adoration,  and  see  her 
beautiful  face  as  radiantly  beautiful  as  ever  and  as 


158  NIELS  LYHNE 

full  of  majesty,  shining  with  the  same  immortal 
light,  no  matter  how  much  dust  is  whirled  up 
around  her  white  forehead,  no  matter  how  thickly 
the  poisonous  fog  closes  in  around  her  halo.  It  is 
bitterly  disheartening,  and  your  soul  suffers  injury 
inevitably,  for  it  is  so  easy  to  hate  until  your  heart 
is  weary,  or  to  draw  around  you  the  cold  shadows 
of  contempt,  or  to  be  dulled  by  pain  and  let  the 
world  go  its  own  way. —  Of  course,  if  there  is  that 
within  you  which  makes  you  not  choose  the  easiest 
way  nor  evade  the  whole  matter,  but  walk  upright 
with  all  your  faculties  tense  and  all  your  sympathies 
wide  awake,  taking  the  blows  and  stings  of  defeat  as 
the  scourge  falls  on  your  back  again  and  again,  and 
still  keep  your  bleeding  hope  from  drooping,  while 
you  listen  for  the  distant  rumblings  that  presage 
revolution,  and  look  for  the  faint,  distant  dawn  that 
some  day — some  time,  perhaps  ...  If  you  have 
that  within  you! — but  don't  try  it,  Lyhne.  Ima- 
gine what  the  life  of  such  a  man  must  be,  if  he  is  to 
be  true  to  himself  Never  to  open  his  mouth  with- 
out knowing  that  whatever  he  says  will  be  met  w^ith 
scorn  and  jeers!  To  have  his  words  distorted, 
besmirched,  wrenched  all  out  of  joint,  turned  into 
cunning  snares  for  his  own  feet,  and  then,  before 
he  can  pick  them  up  from  the  mud  and  straighten 
them  out  again,  to  find  all  the  world  suddenly  deaf. 
Then  to  begin  over  again  at  another  point  and 
have  the  same  thing  happen  over  and  over  again. 


CHAPTER  IX  159 

And  —  what  hurts  most,  perhaps  —  to  be  misun- 
derstood and  despised  by  noble  men  and  women, 
whom  he  looks  up  to  with  admiration  and  respect 
in  spite  of  their  different  principles.  Yet  it  must  be 
so,  it  cannot  be  otherwise.  Those  who  are  in  oppo- 
sition must  not  expect  to  be  attacked  for  what  they 
really  are  or  really  want,  but  for  what  the  party  in 
power  is  pleased  to  think  they  are  and  want;  and 
besides,  power  used  upon  the  weaker  must  be  mis- 
used—  how  can  it  be  otherwise?  Surely  no  one  can 
expect  the  party  in  power  to  divest  itself  of  its  ad- 
vantages in  order  to  meet  the  opposition  on  equal 
terms;  but  that  does  not  make  the  struggle  of  the 
opposition  less  painful  and  heart-rending.  When 
you  think  of  all  this,  Lyhne,  do  you  really  suppose 
a  man  can  fight  this  battle,  with  all  these  vulture- 
beaks  buried  in  his  flesh,  unless  he  has  the  blind, 
stubborn  enthusiasm  which  we  call  fanaticism  ?  And 
how  in  the  world  can  he  get  fanatic  about  a  nega- 
tion? Fanatic  for  the  idea  that  there  is  no  God!  — 
But  without  fanaticism  there  is  no  victory.  Hush, 
listen!" 

They  stopped  before  a  house  where  a  curtain 
had  been  rolled  up,  allowing  them  to  look  into  a 
large  room,  and  through  the  slightly  opened  win- 
dow a  song  floated  out  to  them,  borne  on  the  clear 
voices  of  women  and  children: 


i6o  NIELS  LYHNE 

"  A  child  is  horn  in  Bethlehem^ 
In  Bethlehem. 
Therefore  rejoice^  'Jerusalem! 
Hallelujah^  Hallelujah! ^^ 

They  walked  on  silently.  The  song  and  especially 
the  notes  of  the  piano  followed  them  down  the 
quiet  street. 

"Did  you  hear?"  said  Hjerrild.  "Did  you  hear 
the  enthusiasm  in  that  old  Hebraic  shout  of  tri- 
umph? And  those  two  Jewish  names  of  towns! 
Jerusalem  was  not  only  symbolic:  the  entire  city, 
Copenhagen,  Denmark,  it  was  t/j",  the  Christian 
people  within  the  people." 

"There  is  no  God,  and  man  is  his  prophet,"  re- 
plied Niels  bitterly  and  rather  sadly. 

"Exactly,"  scoffed  Hjerrild.  "After  all,  atheism 
is  unspeakably  tame.  Its  end  and  aim  is  nothing 
but  a  disillusioned  humanity.  The  belief  in  a  God 
who  rules  everything  and  judges  everything  is  hu- 
manity's last  great  illusion,  and  when  that  is  gone, 
what  then?  Then  you  are  wiser;  but  richer,  hap- 
pier? I  can't  see  it." 

"But  don't  you  see,"  exclaimed  Niels  Lyhne, 
"that  on  the  day  when  men  are  free  to  exult  and 
say :  'There  is  no  God! '  on  that  day  a  new  heaven 
and  a  new  earth  will  be  created  as  if  by  magic. 
Then  and  not  till  then  will  heaven  be  a  free  infinite 
space  instead  of  a  spying,  threatening  eye.  Then 
the  earth  will  be  ours  and  we  the  earth's,  when  the 


CHAPTER  IX  i6i 

dim  world  of  bliss  or  damnation  beyond  has  burst 
like  a  bubble.  The  earth  will  be  our  true  mother 
country,  the  home  of  our  hearts,  where  we  dwell, 
not  as  strangers  and  wayfarers  a  short  time,  but 
all  our  time.  Think  what  intensity  it  will  give  to 
life,  when  everything  must  be  concentrated  within 
it  and  nothing  left  for  a  hereafter.  The  immense 
stream  of  love  that  is  now  rising  up  to  the  God  of 
men's  faith  will  bend  to  earth  again  and  flow  lov- 
ingly among  all  those  beautiful  human  virtues  with 
which  we  have  endowed  and  embellished  the  god- 
head in  order  to  make  it  worthy  of  our  love.  Good- 
ness, justice,  wisdom, —  who  can  name  them  all? 
Don't  you  see  what  nobility  it  will  give  men  when! 
they  are  free  to  live  their  life  and  die  their  death,! 
without  fear  of  hell  or  hope  of  heaven,  but  fearing 
themselves,  hoping  for  themselves?  How  their  con- 
sciences will  grow,  and  what  a  strength  it  will  give 
them  when  inactive  repentance  and  humility  can- 
not atone  any  more,  when  no  forgiveness  is  possi- 
ble except  to  redeem  with  good  what  they  sinned 

with  evil." 

"You  must  have  a  wonderful  faith  in  humanity. 
Why,  then  atheism  will  make  greater  demands  on 
men  than  Christianity  has  done." 

"Of  course!" 

"Of  course ;  but  where  will  you  get  all  the  strong 
individuals  you  will  need  to  make  up  your  athe- 
istical community?" 


1 62  NIELS  LYHNE 

"Little  by  little;  atheism  itself  must  develop 
them.  Neither  this  generation  nor  the  next  and  not 
the  next  after  that  will  be  ripe  for  atheism,  of  that 
I  am  quite  aware,  but  in  every  generation  there  will 
be  a  few  who  will  honestly  struggle  to  live  and  die 
in  it  and  will  win.  These  people  will,  in  course  of 
time,  form  a  group  of  spiritual  ancestors  to  whom 
their  descendants  will  look  back  in  pride,  and  from 
whom  they  will  gain  courage.  It  will  be  hardest  in 
the  beginning;  many  will  fail,  and  those  who  win 
will  have  torn  banners,  because  they  will  still  be 
steeped  in  traditions  to  the  marrow  of  their  bones; 
it  is  not  only  the  brain  that  has  to  be  convinced, 
but  the  blood  and  nerves,  hopes  and  longings,  even 
dreams!  But  it  does  not  matter;  some  time  it  will 
come,  and  the  few  will  be  the  many." 

"You  think  so? — I  am  trying  to  think  of  a  name; 
could  we  call  it  pietistical  atheism?" 

"All  true  atheism  —  "Niels  began,  but  Hjerrild 
cut  him  short. 

"Of  course,"  he  said,  "of  course!  By  all  means, 
let  us  have  only  a  single  gate,  one  needle's  eye  for 
all  the  camels  on  the  face  of  the  earth." 


Chapter  X 

EARLY  that  summer  Erik  Refstrup  came  home 
after  his  two  years  in  Italy.  He  had  gone  away 
a  sculptor;  he  returned  a  painter,  and  he  had  already 
attracted  attention,  had  sold  his  pictures,  and  re- 
ceived orders  for  others. 

The  good  fortune  coming  almost  at  his  first 
call  was  due  to  the  sure  instinct  for  self-limitation 
which  bound  his  art  closely  to  his  own  personality. 
His  gift  was  not  of  the  large  and  generous  kind 
that  is  instinct  with  every  promise  and  seems  about 
to  grasp  every  laurel,  that  sweeps  triumphantly 
through  every  realm  like  a  bacchanalian  troop, 
scattering  golden  seed  on  every  side,  and  mounting 
genii  on  all  its  panthers!  He  was  one  of  those  in 
whom  a  dream  is  buried,  making  a  peaceful  sanc- 
tuary in  one  corner  of  their  souls  where  they  are 
most,  and  yet  least,  themselves.  Through  every- 
thing these  people  create  there  sounds  the  same 
wistful  refrain,  and  every  work  of  art  that  comes 
from  their  hands  bears  the  same  timidly  circum- 
scribed stamp  of  kinship,  as  if  they  were  all  pictures 
from  the  same  little  homeland,  the  same  little  nook 
deep  among  mountains.  It  was  so  with  Erik;  no 
matter  where  he  plunged  into  the  ocean  of  beauty, 
he  always  fetched  the  same  pearl  up  to  the  light. 

His  canvases  were  small:  in  the  foreground  a 
single  figure,  clay-blue  with  its  own  shadow,  behind 


1 64  NIELS  LYHNE 

it  a  heathery  stretch  of  moor  or  campagna,  and  in 
the  horizon  a  reddish  yellow  afterglow  of  sunset. 
There  was  one  picture  of  a  young  girl  telling  her 
own  fortune  in  the  ItaHan  fashion.  She  is  kneeling 
on  a  spot  where  the  earth  shows  brown  between 
tufts  of  short  grass.  The  heart,  cross,  and  anchor  of 
hammered  silver,  which  she  has  taken  from  her 
necklace,  are  scattered  on  the  ground.  Now  she  is 
lying  on  her  knees,  her  eyes  closed  in  good  faith 
with  one  hand  covering  them,  the  other  reaching 
down,  seeking  rapture  of  love  beyond  words,  bitter 
sorrow  solaced  by  the  cross,  or  the  trusting  hope  of 
a  common  fate.  She  has  hot  yet  dared  to  touch  the 
ground.  Her  hand  shrinks  back  in  the  cold,  mys- 
terious shadow;  her  cheeks  are  flushed,  and  her 
mouth  trembles  between  prayer  and  tears.  There 
is  a  solemnity  in  the  air;  the  sunset  glow  threatens, 
hot  and  fierce  out  there  in  the  distance,  but  softly 
melancholy  where  it  steals  in  over  the  heather.  "If 
you  only  knew — rapture  of  love  beyond  words, 
bitter  sorrow  solaced  by  the  cross,  or  the  trusting 
hope  of  a  common  fate?" 

There  was  another  in  which  she  stands  erect 
on  the  brown  heath,  tense  with  longing,  her  cheek 
pressed  down  on  her  folded  hands.  She  is  so  sweet 
in  her  naive  longing  and  a  wee  bit  sad  and  angered 
with  life  for  passing  her  by.  Why  does  not  Eros 
come  with  kissing  roses  .^  Does  he  think  she  is  too 
young?  Ah,  if  he  would  only  feel  her  heart,  how  it 


CHAPTER  X  165 

beats!  If  he  would  only  lay  his  hand  there!  A 
world  is  in  there,  a  world  of  worlds,  if  it  would  only 
awaken.  But  why  does  it  not  call?  It  is  there  like 
a  bud,  tightly  folded  around  its  own  sweetness  and 
beauty,  existing  only  for  itself,  oppressed  by  itself. 
For  it  knows  there  is  something  in  life  that  it  does 
not  know.  It  is  that  which  has  warmed  the  shelter- 
ing petals  and  given  light  to  the  innermost  heart  of 
reddest  dusk,  where  the  scent  lies  yet  scentless,  a 
foreboding  only,  pressed  into  one  tremulous  tear! 

Will  it  never  be  freed  and  breathe  out  all  its 
slumbering  fragrance,  never  be  rich  in  its  own 
wealth?  Will  it  never,  never  unfold  and  blush  itself 
awake  with  gleaming  rays  of  sunlight  darting  in 
under  its  petals  ?  She  has  no  patience  any  more  with 
Eros!  Her  lips  are  quivering  with  approaching 
tears;  her  eyes  look  out  into  space  with  hopeless 
defiance,  and  the  little  head  sinks  more  and  more 
forlornly,  turning  the  delicate  profile  in  toward  the 
picture,  where  a  gentle  breeze  wafts  the  reddish 
dust  over  dark  green  broom  against  a  sherry-golden 
sky. 

That  was  the  way  Erik  painted.  What  he  had 
to  say  always  found  expression  in  pictures  such  as 
these.  He  would  sometimes  dream  in  other  images 
and  long  to  break  through  that  narrow  circle  within 
which  he  created,  but  when  he  had  strayed  beyond 
his  bounds  and  tried  his  powers  in  other  fields,  he 
always  returned  with  a  chill  sense  of  discourage- 


i66  NIELS  LYHNE 

ment,  feeling  that  he  had  been  borrowing  from 
others  and  producing  something  not  his  own.  After 
these  unfortunate  excursions  —  which,  however,  al- 
ways taught  him  more  than  he  was  aware  of — he 
became  more  intensely  Erik  Refstrup  than  ever 
before.  Then  he  would  abandon  himself  with  more 
reckless  courage  and  with  almost  poignant  fervor 
to  the  cult  of  his  own  individuality,  while  his  whole 
manner  of  associating  with  himself,  to  his  slightest 
act,  would  be  suffused  with  a  religious  enthusiasm. 
He  seemed  surrounded  by  shadowy  throngs  of 
beautiful  forms,  younger  sisters  of  the  slender- 
limbed  women  of  Parmigianino  with  their  long 
necks  and  large,  narrow  princess  hands;  they  sat 
at  his  table,  poured  his  wine  with  movements  full 
of  noble  grace,  and  held  him  in  the  spell  of  their 
fair  dreams  with  Luini's  mystic,  contemplative 
smile,  so  inscrutably  subtle  in  its  enigmatic  sweet- 
ness. 

But  when  he  had  served  the  god  faithfully  for 
eleven  days,  it  sometimes  happened  that  other 
powers  gained  the  ascendancy  over  him,  and  he 
would  be  seized  with  a  violent  craving  for  the  coarse 
enjoyment  of  gross  pleasures:  Then  he  would 
plunge  into  dissipations,  feverish  with  that  human 
thirst  for  self-destruction  which  yearns,  when  the 
blood  burns  as  hotly  as  blood  can  burn,  for  degra- 
dation, perverseness,  filth,  and  smut,  with  precisely 
the   measure   of  strength    possessed    by   another 


CHAPTER  X  167 

equally  human  longing,  the  longing  to  keep  one's 
self  greater  than  one's  self  and  purer. 

In  these  moments  there  was  but  little  that  was 
rough  and  coarse  enough  for  him,  and  when  they  had 
passedjitwaslongbeforehecouldregain  his  balance; 
for  in  truth  these  excesses  were  not  natural  to  him; 
he  was  too  healthy  for  them,  too  little  poisoned  by 
brooding.  In  a  sense,  they  came  as  a  rebound  from 
his  devotion  to  the  higher  spirits  of  his  art,  almost 
like  a  revenge,  as  though  his  nature  had  been  vio- 
lated by  the  pursuit  of  those  idealistic  aims  which 
choice,  aided  by  circumstances,  had  made  his  own. 

This  twofold  struggle,  however,  was  not  carried 
on  along  such  definite  lines  that  it  appeared  on  the 
surface  of  Erik  Refstrup's  life;  nor  did  he  feel  the 
need  of  making  his  friends  understand  him  in  this 
phase.  No,  he  was  the  same  simple,  happy-go-lucky 
fellow  as  of  old,  slightly  awkward  in  his  shrinking 
from  emotions  put  into  words,  a  little  of  a  freebooter 
in  his  capacity  for  seizing  and  holding.  Yet  the  other 
thing  was  in  him  and  could  be  sensed  sometimes  in 
quiet  moments,  like  the  bells  that  ring  in  a  sunken 
city  on  the  bottom  of  the  sea.  He  and  Niels  had 
never  understood  each  other  so  well  as  now;  both 
felt  it,  and  silently  each  renewed  the  old  friendship. 
And  when  vacation  time  came,  and  Niels  felt  that 
he  really  must  make  his  long-deferred  visit  to  his 
Aunt  Rosalie,  who  was  married  to  Consul  Claudi 
in  Fjordby,  Erik  went  with  him. 


i68  NIELS  LYHNE 

The  main  highway  from  the  richest  district  above 
Fjordby  enters  the  town  between  two  great  thorn- 
hedges,  which  bound  Consul  Claudi's  vegetable 
garden  and  his  large  pleasure  garden  by  the  shore. 
What  then  becomes  of  the  road — whether  it  ends 
in  the  Consul's  courtyard,  which  is  as  large  as  a 
market-place,  or  whether  it  is  continued  in  a  bend 
running  between  his  hayloft  and  his  lumberyard  to 
form,  later,  the  main  street  of  the  town — is  a  matter 
of  opinion.  Many  travellers  follow  the  bend  and 
drive  on,  but  there  are  also  many  who  stop  and 
think  the  goal  reached  when  they  have  come  within 
the  Consul's  wide  tarred  gateway,  where  the  doors 
are  always  thrown  back  and  covered  with  skins 
spread  for  drying. 

The  buildings  on  the  premises  were  all  old  with 
the  exception  of  the  tall  warehouse  with  its  dead- 
looking  slate  roof,  the  newest  architectural  feature 
in  Fjordby.  The  long,  low  main  building  appeared 
to  be  forced  to  its  knees  by  three  large  gables,  and 
was  joined,  in  a  dim  corner,  to  the  wing  containing 
the  kitchen  and  stables;  in  another  lighter  corner, 
to  the  warehouse.  In  the  dark  corner  was  the  back 
door  of  the  store,  which  formed,  with  the  peasants' 
waiting-room,  the  office,  and  the  servants'  hall,  a 
rather  dingy  world  of  its  own,  where  the  mingled 
odor  of  cheap  tobacco  and  moldy  floors,  of  spices 
and  dried  codfish  and  wet  wool,  made  the  air  so 
thick  you  could  almost  taste  it.  But  when  you  had 


CHAPTER  X  169 

passed  through  the  office  with  its  pungent  smoke 
of  sealing-wax  and  had  reached  the  hall  which 
formed  the  dividing  line  between  the  business  and 
the  family,  a  prevailing  perfume  of  new  millinery 
prepared  you  for  the  delicate  scent  in  the  living- 
rooms.  It  was  not  the  fragrance  of  any  nosegay  or 
of  any  real  flower;  it  was  the  intangible,  memory- 
laden  atmosphere  which  pervades  a  home,  though 
no  one  can  say  whence  it  comes.  Every  home  has 
its  own,  and  it  may  suggest  a  thousand  things  — 
the  smell  of  old  gloves  or  new  playing-cards  or 
open  pianos — but  it  is  always  different.  It  may  be 
stifled  by  incense,  perfumes,  or  cigar  smoke,  but  it 
cannot  be  killed;  it  always  comes  back  unchanged 
and  is  there  just  as  before.  Here  it  was  of  flowers, 
not  stock  or  roses  or  any  other  flower  that  can  be 
•  named,  but  rather  as  one  might  fancy  the  scent  of 
those  fantastic,  pale  sapphire  lilies  that  twine  their 
blossoms  around  vases  of  old  porcelain.  And  how 
well  it  went  with  those  wide,  low  rooms  with  their 
heirloom  furniture  and  their  stiff,  old-fashioned 
grace !  The  floors  were  white  as  only  grandmothers' 
floors  can  be;  the  walls  were  in  plain  colors  with  a 
light  tracery  of  garlands  in  delicate  tints  running 
under  the  ceiling,  which  had  a  stucco  rose  in  the 
centre.  The  doors  were  fluted  and  had  knobs  of 
shining  brass  in  the  shape  of  dolphins.  The  windows 
of  small  square  panes  were  curtained  with  fllmy  net, 
white  as  snow,  its  fullness  caught  up  and  fastened 


1 70  NIELS  LYHNE 

with  coquettish  bows  of  colored  ribbon,  like  the  cur- 
tains of  a  bridal  bed  for  Corydon  and  Phyllis.  In  the 
window-sill  the  flowers  of  bygone  days  bloomed  in 
motley  green  crocks;  there  were  blue  agapanthus, 
blue  Canterbury  bells,  fine-leaved  myrtles,  fiery  red 
verbenas,  and  butterfly  bright  geraniums.  But  it 
was,  after  all,  chiefly  the  furniture  that  gave  charac- 
ter to  the  rooms:  immovable  tables  with  wide  ex- 
panse of  darkened  mahogany;  chairs  with  backs 
that  curled  round  your  figure ;  cabinets  of  every  con- 
ceivable form,  gigantic  dressers  inlaid  with  myth- 
ological scenes  in  light  yellow  wood  —  Daphne, 
Arachne,  and  Narcissus  —  or  small  secretaries  with 
thin  twisted  legs  and  on  every  tiny  drawer  a  mosaic 
of  dendrite  marble  representing  a  lovely  square 
house  with  a  tree  near  by  —  all  from  the  time  be- 
fore Napoleon.  There  were  mirrors,  too,  the  glass 
painted  in  white  or  bronze  with  designs  of  rushes 
and  lotus  plants  floating  on  a  bright  sea.  As  for  the 
sofa,  it  was  not  one  of  your  trifling  things  on  four 
legs  designed  for  two  persons ;  no,  solid  and  mas- 
sive it  rose  from  the  floor  to  form  a  veritable  spa- 
cious terrace;  flanking  it  on  either  side  and  built 
in  one  with  the  sofa,  was  a  console-cupboard,  on 
top  of  which  a  smaller  cabinet  rose  with  architec- 
tonic effect  to  the  height  of  a  man  and  held  a  pre- 
cious old  jar  above  the  reach  of  careless  hands.  It 
was  no  wonder  there  were  so  many  old  things  in  the 
Consul's  house,  for  his  father  and  grandfather  had 


CHAPTER  X  171 

rested  and  enjoyed  the  good  things  of  life  within 
these  walls  in  the  intervals  of  their  work  in  lumber 
yard  and  office. 

The  grandfather,  Berendt  Berendtsen  Claudi, 
whose  name  the  firm  still  bore,  had  built  the  houses 
and  had  interested  himself  chiefly  in  the  retail  and 
produce  trade.  The  father  had  worked  up  the  lum- 
ber yard,  bought  farmland,  built  the  hayloft,  and 
laid  out  the  two  gardens.  The  present  Claudi  had 
developed  the  grain  trade  and  built  the  warehouse. 
He  united  with  his  mercantile  business  the  activ- 
ities of  the  English  and  the  Hanoverian  vice-con- 
sulates as  well  as  a  Lloyd's  agency;  and  the  grain 
and  the  Western  Sea  kept  him  so  busy  he  could 
give  only  a  very  cursory  supervision  to  the  other 
branches  of  the  work.  He  therefore  divided  the  re- 
sponsibility between  an  insolvent  cousin  and  an  old 
unmanageable  steward,  who  would  drive  the  Consul 
into  a  corner  every  little  while  by  declaring  that, 
whatever  happened  to  the  store,  the  farm  must  be 
attended  to,  and  when  he  wanted  to  plough,  they 
could  take  horses  for  hauling  lumber  wherever  they 
pleased  —  his  they  could  n't  have,  so  help  him.  But 
as  the  man  was  capable,  there  was  nothing  to  be 
done  but  to  put  up  with  him. 

Consul  Claudi  was  in  the  early  fifties,  a  man  of 
substantial  presence.  His  regular  features,  strong  to 
the  point  of  coarseness,  would  as  readily  harden 
to  an  expression  of  energy  and  cool  astuteness  as 


172  NIELS  LYHNE 

they  would  relax  into  a  look  almost  lickerish  as 
though  relishing  a  savory  tidbit;  and  he  was,  in 
fact,  equally  at  home  whether  driving  a  bargain 
with  shrewd  peasants  or  arguing  with  a  stubborn 
salvage  gang,  or  whether  sitting  with  gray-bearded 
sinners  over  the  last  bottle  of  port  wine,  listening 
to  stories  more  than  salacious  or  telling  them  with 
the  picturesque  frankness  for  which  he  was  noted. 

This,  however,  was  not  all  of  the  man. 

His  training  naturally  made  him  feel  that  he  was 
on  alien  ground  when  heventured  outside  of  purely 
practical  questions,  but  he  never  therefore  scoffed 
at  what  he  did  not  understand  or  tried  to  conceal 
his  ignorance.  Much  less  did  it  ever  occur  to  him 
to  give  his  opinion  and  demand  that  it  be  respected 
for  the  reason  that  he  was  a  citizen  of  mature  years 
and  practical  experience  and  a  large  taxpayer.  On 
the  contrary,  he  would  often  listen  with  a  reverence 
that  was  almost  touching  when  ladies  and  young 
men  discussed  such  matters ;  now  and  then  he  would 
venture  a  modest  question  prefaced  by  elaborate 
excuses,  which  almost  always  elicited  a  scrupulously 
painstaking  answer,  and  then  he  would  express  his 
thanks  with  all  the  courtesy  which  is  so  gracious  in 
an  older  man  thanking  his  juniors. 

At  certain  favorable  moments  there  could  be 
something  surprisingly  fine  about  Consul  Claudi, 
a  wistful  look  in  his  clear  brown  eyes,  a  melancholy 
smile  around  his  strong  lips,  a  seeking,  reminiscent 


CHAPTER  X  173 

note  in  his  voice,  as  though  he  yearned  for  another 
and  in  his  own  eyes  better  world  than  that  to 
which  his  friends  and  acquaintances  consigned  him, 
hide  and  hair. 

The  messenger  between  himself  and  this  better 
world  was  his  wife.  She  was  one  of  those  pale, 
gentle,  virginal  natures  who  have  not  the  courage, 
or  perhaps  not  the  impulse,  to  give  out  their  love 
in  such  fullness  that  there  is  no  shred  of  self  left 
in  their  innermost  soul.  Even  in  the  most  fleeting 
moment  they  can  never  be  so  carried  away  by  their 
feeling  that  they  throw  themselves  in  blind  rapture 
under  the  chariot  wheels  of  their  idol.  They  cannot 
do  it,  but  all  else  they  can  do  for  the  beloved;  they 
can  fulfil  the  heaviest  duties,  are  ready  for  the  most 
grievous  sacrifices,  and  do  not  flinch  from  any 
humiliation  whatsoever.  This  is  true  of  the  best 
among  them. 

Mrs.  Claudi  was  not  called  on  to  bear  such  trials. 
Nevertheless  her  marriage  was  not  without  its  sor- 
rows; for  it  was  a  matter  of  common  knowledge 
in  Fjordby  that  the  Consul  was  not,  or  at  least  had 
not  been  until  a  few  years  ago,  the  most  faithful 
husband,  and  that  he  had  several  illegitimate  chil- 
dren in  the  neighborhood.  This  was,  of  course,  a 
bitter  grief  to  her,  and  it  had  not  been  easy  to  keep 
her  heart  steadfast  through  the  tumult  of  jealousy, 
scorn  and  anger,  shame  and  sickening  fear,  which 
had  made  her  feel  as  though  the  ground  were  slip- 


174  NIELS  LYHNE 

ping  away  under  her  feet.  But  she  stood  firm.  Not 
only  did  she  never  allow  a  reproachful  word  to  pass 
her  lips,  but  she  warded  off  any  confession  on  the 
part  of  her  husband,  any  direct  prayer  for  forgive- 
ness, and  anything  that  might  seem  like  a  repentant 
vow.  Shefelt  that  if  it  were  ever  put  into  words,  they 
might  sweep  her  along  and  away  from  him.  Silently 
she  would  bear  it,  and  in  the  silence  she  tried  to 
make  herself  believe  that  she  was  in  part  to  blame 
for  her  husband's  crime,  because  of  the  barrier  she 
had  built  around  herself,  which  her  love  had  not 
been  strong  enough  to  break  down.  She  succeeded 
in  magnifying  this  sin  until  she  felt  an  indistinct 
need  of  forgiveness,  and  in  course  of  time  she 
brought  herself  to  the  point  where  she  gave  rise  to 
a  rumor  that  the  girls  whom  Consul  Claudi  had 
seduced  and  their  children  were  taken  care  of  in 
other  ways  than  with  money;  it  seemed  that  a  hid- 
den woman's  hand  must  be  sheltering  them,  keep- 
ing them  from  harm, supporting  and  guiding  them. 

So  it  came  to  pass  that  evil  was  turned  into  good, 
and  a  sinner  and  a  saint  each  made  the  other  better. 

The  Claudis  had  two  children,  a  son  who  was  in 
a  merchant's  office  in  Hamburg  and  a  nineteen- 
year-old  daughter  named  Fennimore  afterthe  hero- 
ine in  Sf.  Rochcy  one  of  Frau  von  Palzow's  novels 
which  had  been  very  popular  in  the  time  of  Mrs. 
Claudi's  girlhood. 

Fennimore  and  the  Consul  came  down  to  meet 


CHAPTER  X  175 

the  steamer  on  the  day  it  brought  Niels  and  Erik  to 
Fjordby.  Niels  was  pleasantly  surprised  to  see  that 
his  cousin  was  pretty,  for  hitherto  he  had  known 
her  only  from  a  terrible  old  family  daguerreotype, 
where  she  appeared  in  a  misty  atmosphere,  forming 
a  group  with  her  brother  and  her  parents,  all  with 
hectic  crimson  on  their  cheeks  and  bright  gilding 
on  their  jewelry.  And  now  he  found  her  simply 
lovely  as  she  stood  there  in  her  light  morning  dress 
and  her  dainty  little  shoes  with  their  black  ribbons 
crossing  a  white-stockinged  instep.  She  was  rest- 
ing one  foot  on  the  plank  at  the  edge  of  the  pier, 
and  bent  forward  smiling  to  give  him  her  parasol- 
handle  for  a  handshake  and  a  welcome,  before  the 
steamer  was  made  fast.  Her  lips  were  so  red  and  her 
teeth  so  white,  and  her  forehead  and  temples  so  deli- 
cately outlined  under  the  wide  brim  of  her  Eugenie 
hat,  from  which  shadowing  edges  of  deep  black  lace 
fell  weighted  with  bright  jet. 

At  last  the  gangplank  was  let  down,  and  the  Con- 
sul started  off  with  Erik.  He  had  already  introduced 
himself  with  twelve  feet  of  water  between  them  and, 
still  shouting,  had  drawn  Erik  into  a  humorous  con- 
versation about  the  agonies  of  sea-sickness,  which 
he  carried  on  with  a  wizened  hatter's  widow  on 
board.  Now  he  was  calling  on  him  to  admire  the 
large  linden  trees  outside  of  the  revenue  collector's 
house  and  the  new  schooner  standing  ready  to  be 
launched  from  Thomas  Rasmussen's  shipyard. 


176  NIELS  LYHNE 

Niels  walked  with  Fennimore.  She  pointed  to 
the  flag  flying  in  the  garden  in  honor  of  him  and 
his  friend,  and  then  they  began  to  discuss  the  Neer- 
gaards  in  Copenhagen.  They  quickly  agreed  that 
Mrs.  Neergaard  was  a  little  —  a  very  little — they 
would  not  say  the  word,  but  Fennimore  smiled 
primly  and  made  a  cat-like  movement  with  her 
hand.  The  characterization  was  evidently  plain 
enough  to  them  both,  for  they  smiled  and  quickly 
became  serious  again.  Silently  they  walked  on,  each 
wondering  how  he  or  she  appeared  in  the  other's 
eyes. 

Fennimore  had  imagined  Niels  Lyhne  taller, 
more  distinguished,  and  of  an  individuality  more 
marked  —  like  an  underscored  word.  He,  on  the 
other  hand,  had  found  much  more  than  he  ex- 
pected. He  thought  her  charming,  almost  alluring, 
in  spite  of  her  dress  which  savored  too  much  of 
small  town  elegance.  When  they  had  entered  the 
hall,  and  she  stood  looking  down  with  a  preoccu- 
pied air,  as  she  took  oflf  her  hat  and  smoothed  her 
hair  with  wonderfully  soft,  languid,  graceful  turns 
of  hand  and  wrist,  he  felt  as  grateful  as  if  her  move- 
ments had  been  caresses.  This  almost  puzzling 
sense  of  gratitude  did  not  leave  him  either  that  day 
or  the  next,  and  sometimes  it  welled  up  so  strong 
and  warm  that  he  felt  it  would  have  been  the  great- 
est happiness  if  he  might  have  thanked  her  in  words 
for  being  so  pretty  and  so  sweet. 


CHAPTER  X  177 

Very  soon  Erik  as  well  as  Niels  feltquite  at  home 
in  the  Consul's  hospitable  house.  Before  many  days 
they  had  slipped  into  that  pleasantly  arranged 
idling  which  is  the  real  vacation  life  and  which  it  is 
so  difficult  to  guard  against  the  friendly  encroach- 
ments of  well-meaning  people.  They  had  to  use  all 
their  diplomacy  to  avoid  the  stuffy  evening  parties, 
large  boating  excursions,  summer  balls,  and  ama- 
teur theatricals  which  were  constantly  threatening 
their  peace.  They  were  ready  to  wish  that  the  Con- 
sul's house  and  garden  had  been  on  a  desert  island; 
and  Robinson  Crusoe  was  not  more  agitated  by  fear 
on  finding  the  footsteps  in  the  sand  than  they  were 
at  the  sight  of  strange  paletots  in  the  hall  or  unfa- 
miliar reticules  on  the  sitting-room  table.  They 
much  preferred  to  be  by  themselves ;  for  they  had 
scarcely  passed  the  middle  of  the  first  week  before 
they  were  both  in  love  with  Fennimore.  It  was 
not  the  mature  passion  which  must  and  will  know 
its  fate  and  longs  to  have  and  to  hold  and  to  be  as- 
sured. As  yet  it  was  only  the  first  dawn  of  love  like 
a  hint  of  spring  in  the  air,  instinct  with  a  longing 
akin  to  sadness  and  with  an  unrest  that  is  gently 
pulsing  joy.  The  heart  is  so  tender  and  yielding  and 
easily  moved.  A  light  on  the  water,  a  rustling  in  the 
leaves,  a  flower  unfolding  its  petals  —  all  seem  to 
have  a  strange  new  power.  Vague  hopes  without  a 
name  burst  out,  suddenly  flooding  the  earth  with 
sunlight  and  as  suddenly  vanishing  again:  weakde- 


1 78  NIELS  LYHNE 

spondency  sails  like  a  broad  cloud  over  the  glory, 
churning  the  flashes  of  hope  down  into  its  own  gray 
wake. — Then  hopelessness,  melting  hopelessness; 
bittersweet  resignation  to  fate,  a  heart  full  of  self- 
pity,  renunciation  gazing  at  its  own  reflection  in 
quiet  elegies  and  fainting  in  a  sigh  that  is  half  dis- 
sembled. .  .  .  But  again  there  is  the  whispering  of 
roses:  a  dreamland  rises  from  the  mist  with  golden 
haze  over  soft  beech  crowns  and  with  fragrant  sum- 
mer darkness  under  leafy  boughs  arched  over  paths 
that  lead  no  one  knows  whither. 

One  evening  after  tea  they  were  all  gathered  in  the 
sitting-room.  The  garden  and  all  outdoor  amuse- 
ments were  barred,  for  the  rain  was  pouring  down ; 
but  no  one  seemed  to  mind.  The  sense  of  being  shut 
in  gave  the  room  something  of  the  snug  comfort  of 
a  winter  evening,  and  moreover  the  rain  was  a  bless- 
ing. Everything  had  been  so  parched  and  dry,  but 
now  the  water  streamed  down,  and  when  the  heavy 
drops  rattled  against  the  frame  of  the  reflector  in 
the  window  the  sound  called  up  vague,  fleeting 
glimpses  of  luscious  green  meadows  and  freshened 
foliage.  Now  and  then  some  one  would  say  under 
his  breath :  "How  it  pours ! "  and  glance  at  the  win- 
dow-panes with  a  little  gleam  of  pleasure  and  a  half- 
conscious  luxuriating  in  fellow-feeling  with  every- 
thing out  of  doors.  Erik  had  fetched  the  mandolin 
he  had  brought  with  him  from  Italy  and  sang  about 


CHAPTER  X  179 

Napoli  and  the  bright  stars.  Then  a  young  lady 
who  had  been  to  tea  sat  down  at  the  piano  and  ac- 
companied her  own  rendering  of  "My  little  nook 
among  the  mountains/'  in  Swedish,  making  the  ah's 
very  broad  to  get  the  right  Swedish  effect. 

Niels,  who  was  not  particularly  musical,  let  him- 
self be  soothed  into  a  gentle  melancholy  and  sat 
lost  in  his  own  thoughts,  until  Fennimore  began  to 
sing. 

Then  he  awoke,  but  not  pleasantly. 

Her  song  agitated  him  uncomfortably.  She  was 
no  longer  the  little  country  girl  when  she  gave  her- 
self up  to  the  spell  of  her  own  voice.  Strange  how 
she  let  herself  be  carried  away  by  the  tones,  how 
freely  and  unreservedly  she  poured  herself  into 
them!  He  felt  it  almost  as  something  immodest,  as 
though  she  were  singing  herself  naked  before  him. 
There  was  a  burning  around  his  heart;  his  temples 
throbbed,  and  he  cast  his  eyes  down.  Did  none  of 
the  others  see  it?  No,  they  saw  nothing.  Why,  she 
had  flown  out  of  herself,  away  from  Fjordby,  from 
Fjordby  poetry  and  Fjordby  sentiments  !  She  was 
in  another  and  a  bolder  world,  where  the  passions 
grew  on  high  mountains  and  flung  their  red  blos- 
soms to  the  storm. 

Could  it  be  his  lack  of  musical  sense  that  made 
him  read  so  much  meaning  into  her  song?  He 
could  hardly  persuade  himself  that  it  was  so,  and 
yet  he  wished  it,  for  he  would  much  rather  have  her 


i8o  NIELS  LYHNE 

as  she  usually  appeared.  When  she  sat  at  her  sew- 
ing, talking  in  her  quiet,  tranquil  voice,  or  looking 
up  with  her  clear,  kind  eyes,  his  whole  being  was 
drawn  to  her  with  the  irresistible  strength  of  a  deep, 
calm  longing  for  home.  He  wanted  to  humble  him- 
self before  her,  to  bend  the  knee  and  call  her  holy. 
He  always  felt  a  strange  yearning  to  come  close  to 
her,  not  only  to  her  present  self,  but  to  her  child- 
hood and  all  the  days  he  had  not  known  her.  When 
they  were  alone,  he  would  lead  her  to  talk  of  the 
past,  of  her  little  troubles  and  mistakes  and  the 
vagaries  that  every  childhood  is  full  of.  He  lived  in 
these  memories  and  clung  to  them  with  a  restless 
jealousy  and  a  languishing  desire  to  possess  and  be 
one  with  these  pale  foreshado wings  of  a  life  which 
was  even  now  glowing  in  richer,  riper  colors.  And 
then  came  this  song  so  strangely  powerful!  It  startled 
him  very  much  like  a  wide  sweep  of  horizon  sud- 
denly revealed  by  a  turn  of  the  path,  reducing  the 
forest  dell  which  had  been  his  home  to  a  mere  cor- 
ner in  the  landscape,  and  making  its  little  rippling 
lines  seem  insignificant  beside  the  grandeur  of  the 
hills  and  distant  moors.  —  Oh,  but  the  landscape 
was  2ifata  morgana^  and  what  he  thought  he  heard 
in  her  song  only  a  fantasy;  for  now  she  spoke  just 
as  she  always  did  and  was  her  blessed  self  again. 
Moreover,  he  knew  from  a  thousand  little  things 
that  she  was  like  still  water,  without  storm  or  waves, 
reflecting  the  starry  blue  heavens. 


CHAPTER  X  i8i 

It  was  thus  he  loved  her,  and  thus  he  saw  her; 
and  when  she  was  with  him  she  gradually  formed 
herself  upon  his  image  of  her,  not  with  any  con- 
scious dissembling,  for  after  all  his  conception  was 
partly  true,  and  it  was  only  natural  —  when  his 
every  word  and  look,  his  every  thought  and  dream, 
appealed  to  that  side  of  her  nature  and  did  homage 
to  it  —  that  she  should  assume  the  guise  he  almost 
forced  upon  her.  Besides,  how  could  she  bother 
about  giving  each  and  every  one  a  correct  impres- 
sion of  herself  when  all  her  thoughts  centred  around 
the  one,  Erik,  the  only  one,  her  chosen  lord,  whom 
she  loved  with  a  passion  that  was  not  of  herself  and 
with  an  idolatrous  worship  that  teiT^fied  her.  She 
had  imagined  love  to  be  a  '^./e.t  dignity,  not  this 
consuming  unrest,  full  of  fear  and  humiliation  and 
doubt.  Many  a  time  when  the  declaration  seemed 
trembling  on  Erik's  lips,  she  had  felt  as  if  it  were 
her  duty  to  put  her  hand  on  his  mouth  and  warn 
him  against  speaking,  accusing  herself  and  telling 
him  how  she  had  deceived  him  and  how  unworthy 
of  his  love  she  was,  how  earthly  and  small  and  im- 
pure, so  far  from  noble, so  wretchedly  low  and  com- 
mon and  wicked!  She  felt  herself  dishonest  under 
his  admiring  gaze;  calculating,  when  she  failed  to 
avoid  him ;  criminal,  when  she  could  not  bring  her- 
self to  begGod  in  her  evening  prayer  that  Hewould 
turn  Erik's  heart  from  her  in  order  that  his  life 
might  be  all  sunlight  and  honor  and  glory.  For  she 


i82  NIELS  LYHNE 

knew  that  her  low-born  passion  would  drag  him 
down. 

It  was  almost  in  spite  of  himself  that  Erik  loved 
her.  His  ideal  had  always  been  high,  proud,  and 
noble,  with  quiet  melancholy  suffusing  her  pale 
features  and  coolness  of  temple  air  lingering  in  the 
severefolds  of  her  garment.  But  Fennimore's  sweet- 
ness conquered  him.  He  could  not  resist  her  beauty. 
There  was  such  a  fresh,  innocent  sensuousness 
about  her  whole  form.  When  she  walked  her  gait 
whispered  of  her  body;  there  was  a  nakedness  in 
her  movements  and  a  dreamy  eloquence  in  her  re- 
pose, neither  of  which  she  could  help,  for  she  could 
not  conceal  the  one  or  silence  the  other,  even  had 
she  l^cen  in  the  slightest  degree  conscious  of  their 
existence.  No  one  saw  this  better  than  Erik,  and 
he  was  fully  aware  of  what  a  large  part  her  purely 
physical  beauty  played  in  her  attraction  for  him. 
He  struggled  against  it,  for  there  were  exalted  ideals 
of  love  in  his  soul,  ideals  which  had  their  source, 
perhaps,  not  only  in  tradition  and  poetry,  but  in 
deeper  strata  of  his  nature  than  those  that  appeared 
on  the  surface.  But  whatever  their  source,  they  had 
to  yield. 

He  had  not  yet  confessed  his  love  to  Fennimore, 
when  it  happened  that  the  good  ship  Berendt  Claudi 
came  in.  Inasmuch  as  it  was  going  to  unload  farther 
up  the  fjord,  it  did  not  enter  the  harbor,  but  lay  out 
in  the  stream,  and  as  the  Consul  was  very  proud  of 


CHAPTER  X  183 

his  schooner  and  wanted  to  show  it  to  his  guests, 
they  rowed  out  there  one  afternoon  to  drink  tea  on 
board. 

It  was  a  glorious  day  without  a  breath  of  wind, 
and  all  were  intent  on  a  merry  time.  The  hours 
passed  quickly.  They  drank  English  porter,  set 
their  teeth  in  English  hardtack  as  large  as  moons, 
and  ate  salted  mackerel  caught  on  the  voyage  across 
the  North  Sea.  They  pumped  with  the  ship's  pump 
till  the  water  frothed,  tipped  the  compass,  drew 
water  from  the  casks  with  the  large  tin  siphon,  and 
listened  to  the  mate  playing  his  octagonal  hand  har- 
monica. 

It  was  quite  dark  before  they  were  ready  to  re- 
turn. 

They  separated  into  two  parties.  Erik  and  Fen- 
nimore  and  two  of  the  older  people  went  in  the 
ship's  yawl,  which  was  to  make  a  detour  around  the 
harbor  and  then  row  slowly  to  land,  while  the  rest 
of  the  party  went  in  the  Consul's  own  boat,  which 
was  to  steer  directly  for  the  pier.  This  arrangement 
was  made  in  order  to  hear  how  the  song  would 
sound  over  the  water  on  such  a  quiet  night.  Erik 
and  Fennimore  therefore  sat  together  in  the  stern 
of  the  yawl  and  had  the  mandolin  between  them, 
but  the  singing  was  forgotten  when  the  oars  were 
dipped  in  the  water  and  revealed  an  unusually  bright 
phosphorescence  which  absorbed  their  attention. 

Silently  the  boat  glided  onward,  and  behind  it 


1 84  NIELS  LYHNE 

the  dull,  glassy  surface  was  fluted  with  shifting  lines 
and  rings  of  a  tender  white  light  too  faint  to  pene- 
trate the  darkness  beyond  its  own  groove,  except 
now  and  thenwhen  it  seemed  togive  outa  luminous 
mist.  It  frothed  white  where  the  oars  cut  into  it  and 
slid  backward  in  tremulous  rings  growing  fainter 
and  fainter;  it  was  scattered  from  the  blades  in 
bright  drops  falling  like  a  phosphorescent  rain, 
which  was  extinguished  in  the  air  but  lighted  the 
water  drop  by  drop.  There  was  such  quiet  over  the 
fjord  that  the  sound  of  the  oars  seemed  only  to 
measure  the  stillness  in  pauses  of  equal  length. 
Hushed  and  soft,  the  gray  twilight  brooded  over 
the  soundless  deep;  the  boat  and  its  occupants 
melted  together  in  one  dark  mass,  from  which  the 
phosphorescence  freed  the  plying  oars  and  some- 
times a  trailing  rope's  end,  or  perhaps  the  brown 
impassive  face  of  the  oarsman.  No  one  spoke.  Fen- 
nimore  was  cooling  her  hand  in  the  water;  she  and 
Erik  sat  turning  back  to  look  at  the  network  of 
light  that  trailed  silently  after  the  boat  and  held 
their  thoughts  in  its  fair  meshes. 

A  call  for  a  song  shouted  from  land  roused  them, 
and  together  they  sang  two  or  three  Italian  ro- 
mances to  the  accompaniment  of  the  mandolin. 

Then  all  was  still  again. 

At  last  they  landed  at  the  little  jetty  running 
out  from  the  garden. The  Consul's  empty  boat  was 
moored  alongside,  and  the  party  had  already  gone 


CHAPTER  X  185 

up  to  the  house.  Fennimore's  aunt  and  her  com- 
panion followed  them,  but  Erik  and  Fennimore 
remained  standing  and  looked  after  the  boat  as  it 
returned  to  the  ship.  The  latch  of  the  garden  gate 
fell  with  a  click;  the  sound  of  the  oars  grew  fainter 
and  fainter,  and  the  swelling  of  the  water  around  the 
pier  died  away.  Then  a  breath  stirred  in  the  dark  ' 
trees  around  them  like  a  sigh  that  had  hidden  itself 
and  now  softly  lifted  the  leaves,  flew  away,  and  left 
them  alone. 

In  the  same  moment  they  turned  to  each  other 
and  away  from  the  water.  He  caught  her  hand 
and  slowly,  questioningly,  drew  her  close  and  kissed 
her. "Fennimore!"  he  whispered,  and  they  walked 
through  the  dark  garden. 

"You  have  known  it  long!"  he  said,  and  she  re- 
plied, "Yes."  Then  they  walked  on,  and  the  latch 
fell  once  more. 

Erik  could  not  sleep  when  he  reached  his  room 
at  last,  after  drinking  coflTee  with  the  company  and 
saying  good-night  at  the  street  door. 

There  was  no  air  in  there;  he  flung  the  windows 
wide  open,  then  threw  himself  on  the  couch  and 
listened. 

He  wanted  to  get  out  again. 

How  everything  resounded  through  the  house! 
He  could  hear  the  Consul 's  slippers,  and  now  Mrs. 
Claudi  opened  the  kitchen  door  to  see  if  the  fire  was 
out.  What  in  the  world  could  Niels  want  in  his 


i86  NIELS  LYHNE 

trunk  at  this  time  of  night !  Ah  —  there  was  a  mouse 
behind  the  wainscoting.  Now  some  one  crossed  the 
attic  in  stocking-feet — now  another  —  there  were 
two. — At  last!  He  opened  the  door  to  the  guest- 
room within  and  listened,  then  he  carefully  opened 
the  window,  straddled  over  the  sill,  and  slid  into  the 
courtyard.  He  knew  that  he  could  get  down  to  the 
shore  through  the  mangling-room.  If  any  one  saw 
him,  he  meant  to  say  that  he  had  forgotten  his  man- 
dolin down  by  the  jetty  and  wanted  to  rescue  it  from 
the  dew.  Therefore  he  slung  the  mandolin  on  his 
back. 

The  garden  was  a  little  lighter  now;  there  was  a 
slight  breeze  and  a  bit  of  moon  which  laid  a  tremu- 
lous strip  of  silver  from  the  jetty  out  to  the  Berendt 
Claudi, 

He  went  through  the  garden  out  on  the  stone 
sloping  which  protected  it  from  the  water,  running 
in  abrupt  angles  round  a  large  embankment  and  all 
the  way  out  to  the  end  of  the  harbor  mole.  Balan- 
cing uncomfortably  on  the  flat,  slanting  stones,  he 
finally  reached  the  molehead  and,  rather  out  of 
breath,  sat  down  on  the  bench. 

Above  his  head  the  red  lantern  of  the  harbor 
light  swung  slowly  back  and  forth  with  a  sound  like 
the  sighing  of  iron,  while  the  flag  line  flapped  gently 
against  its  staffs 

The  moon  had  come  out  a  little  more  and  cast  a 
cautious  grayish-white  light  over  the  quiet  ships  in 


CHAPTER  X  187 

the  harbor  and  over  the  maze  of  rectangular  roofs 
and  white  dark-eyed  gables  in  the  town.  Above 
and  beyond  it  all  the  church  steeple  rose,  calm  and 
light. 

He  leaned  back  dreaming,  while  a  wave  of  un- 
utterable joy  and  exultation  surged  through  his 
heart;  he  felt  rich  and  full  of  strength  and  the 
warmth  of  life.  It  seemed  as  though  Fennimore 
must  hear  every  love-thought  that  grew  from  his 
rapture,  vine  in  vine,  and  blossom  on  blossom ;  and 
he  rose,  and  quickly  striking  the  strings  of  the  man- 
dolin  sang  triumphantly   to  the  town  asleep  in 

there: 

"  Wakeful  aloft  lies  my  lassie^ 
She  listens  to  my  song!  " 

Again  and  again,  when  his  heart  grew  too  full,  he 
repeated  the  words  of  the  old  ballad. 

Gradually  he  became  calmer.  Memories  of  the 
hours  in  the  past  when  he  had  felt  weakest,  poorest, 
and  most  forlorn  pressed  in  on  him  with  a  slight, 
tense  pain  like  that  of  the  first  tears  welling  up  in 
the  eyes.  He  sat  down  on  the  bench  again,  and  with 
his  hand  lying  mute  on  the  mandolin  strings,  he 
gazed  out  over  the  blue-gray  expanse  of  the  fjord, 
where  the  moon  bridge  formed  a  glittering  way  past 
the  dark  ship  to  the  lines  of  the  Morso  hills,  drawn 
in  faint,  melancholy  cloud-blue  land  through  a  haze 
of  white. 

And  the  memories  thronged,  but  they  grew  gen- 


1 88  NIELS  LYHNE 

tier,  were  lifted  to  fairer  lands,  and  seemed  lighted 
by  a  roseate  dawn. 

.  .  .  My  lassie! 

He  sang  it  to  himself: 

"  Wakeful  aloft  lies  my  lassie^ 
She  listens  to' my  song!^ 


Chapter  XI 

THREE  years  had  passed;  Erik  and  Fenni- 
more  had  been  married  for  two  years,  and 
made  their  home  in  a  little  villa  at  Mariagerfjord. 
Niels  had  not  seen  Fennimore  since  that  summer 
at  Fjordby.  He  lived  in  Copenhagen  and  went  out 
a  great  deal,  but  had  no  intimate  friends  except  Dr. 
Hjerrild,who  called  himself  old  because  touches  of 
gray  had  begun  to  appear  in  his  dark  hair. 

That  unexpected  engagement  had  been  a  hard 
blow  to  Niels.  It  had  a  benumbing  effect  on  him. 
He  grew  more  bitter  and  less  confiding,  and  had  no 
longer  so  much  enthusiasm  to  pit  against  Hjerrild's 
pessimism.  Though  he  still  ^pursued  his  studies, 
their  plan  was  less  and  less  definite,  while  his  pur- 
pose of  some  time  completing  them  and  beginning 
his  real  life-work  flickered  uncertainly.  He  lived 
much  among  people,  but  very  little  with  them. 
They  interested  him,  but  he  did  not  in  the  least 
care  to  have  them  be  interested  in  him ;  for  he  felt 
the  force  that  should  have  driven  him  to  do  his  part 
with  the  others  or  against  them  slowly  ebbing  out 
of  him.  He  could  wait,  he  told  himself,  even  if  he 
had  to  wait  till  it  was  too  late.  Whoever  has  faith  is 
in  no  hurry — that  was  his  excuse  to  himself.  For 
he  believed  that,  when  he  came  down  to  the  bed- 
rock of  his  own  nature,  he  did  have  faith  strong 
enough  to  move  mountains  —  the  trouble  was  that 


190  NIELS  LYHNE 

he  never  managed  to  set  his  shoulder  to  them.  Once 
in  a  while,  the  impulse  to  create  welled  up  in  him, 
and  he  longed  to  see  a  part  of  himself  freed  in  work 
that  should  be  his  very  own.  For  days  he  would 
be  excited  with  the  happy,  titanic  effort  of  carting 
the  clay  for  his  Adam,  but  he  never  formed  it  in  his 
own  image.  The  will-power  necessary  to  persistent 
self-concentration  was  not  in  him.  Weeks  would 
pass  before  he  could  make  up  his  mind  to  abandon 
the  work,  but  he  did  abandon  it,  asking  himself,  in 
a  fit  of  irritation,  why  he  should  continue.  What 
more  had  he  to  gain?  He  had  tasted  the  rapture  of 
conception ;  there  remained  the  toil  of  rearing,  cher- 
ishing, nourishing,  carrying  to  perfection — Why? 
For  whom  ?  He  was  no  pelican,  he  told  himself.  But 
argue  as  he  might,  he  was  dissatisfied  with  himself 
and  felt  that  he  had  not  fulfilled  his  own  expecta- 
tions; nor  did  it  avail  him  to  carp  at  these  expecta- 
tions and  ask  whether  they  were  well  founded.  He 
had  reached  the  point  where  he  had  to  choose,  for 
when  first  youth  is  past —  early  or  late  in  accordance 
with  each  person's  individuality  —  then,  early  or 
latC;,  dawns  the  day  when  Resignation  comes  to  us 
as  a  temptress,  luring  us  to  forego  the  impossible 
and  be  content.  And  Resignation  has  much  in  her 
favor;  for  how  often  have  not  the  idealistic  aspira- 
tions of  youth  been  beaten  back,  its  enthusiasms 
been  shamed,  its  hopes  laid  waste! — The  ideals, 
the  fair  and  beautiful,  have  lost  nothing  of  their 


CHAPTER  XI  191 

radiance,  but  they  no  longer  walk  here  among  us  as 
in  the  early  days  of  our  youth.  The  broad,  firmly 
planted  stairway  of  worldly  wisdom  has  conveyed 
them  back,  step  by  step,  to  that  heaven  whence  our 
simpler  faith  once  brought  them  down;  and  there 
they  sit,  radiant  but  distant,  smiling  but  weary,  in 
divine  quiescence,  while  the  incense  of  a  slothful 
adoration  rises,  pufFon  pufF,in  festive  convolutions. 

Niels  Lyhne  was  tired.  These  repeated  runnings 
to  a  leap  that  was  never  leaped  had  wearied  him. 
Everything  seemed  to  him  hollow  and  worthless, 
distorted  and  confused,  and,  oh,  so  petty!  He  pre- 
ferred to  stop  his  ears  and  stop  his  mouth  and 
to  immerse  himself  in  studies  that  had  nothing  to 
do  with  the  busy  every-day  world,  but  were  like  an 
ocean  apart,  where  he  could  wander  peacefully  in 
silent  forests  of  seaweed  among  curious  animals. 

He  was  tired,  and  the  root  of  his   weariness 
sprang  from  his  baffled  hope  of  love;  thence  it  had    .,, 
spread,   quickly   and  surely,   through    his  whole   h 
being,  to  all  his  faculties  and  all  his  thoughts.  Now   f 
he  was  cold  and  passionless  enough,  but  in   the 
beginning,  after  the  blow  had  fallen,  his  love  had 
grown,  day  by  day,  with  the  irresistible  power  of  a 
malignant  fever.  There  had  been  moments  when 
his  soul  was  almost  bursting  with  insane  passion; 
it  swelled  like  a  wave  in  its  infinite  longing  and 
frothing  desire;  it  rose  and  went  on  rising  and  ris- 
ing, till  every  fibre  in  his  brain  and  every  cord  in  his 


192  NIELS  LYHNE 

heart  was  strung  tense  to  the  breaking-point.  Then 
weariness  had  come,  soothing  and  healing,  making 
his  nerves  dull  against  pain,  his  blood  too  cold  for 
enthusiasm,  and  his  pulse  too  weak  for  action.  And 
more  than  that,  it  had  protected  him  against  a  re- 
lapse by  giving  him  all  the  prudence  and  egoism  of 
the  convalescent.  When  his  thoughts  went  back  to 
those  days  in  Fjordby,  he  had  a  sense  of  immunity 
akin  to  the  feeling  of  a  man  who  has  just  passed 
through  a  severe  illness  and  knows  that  now,  when 
he  has  endured  his  allotted  agony,  and  the  fever  has 
burned  itself  to  ashes  within  him,  he  will  be  free  for 
a  long,  long  time. 

Then  it  happened,  one  summer  day,  after  Erik 
andFennimore  had  been  married  for  two  years,  that 
he  received  a  half-whining,  half-boasting  letter  from 
Erik,  in  which  he  blamed  himself  for  having  wasted 
his  time  of  late.  He  did  not  know  what  the  matter 
was,  but  he  had  no  ideas.  The  people  he  met  in  the 
neighborhood  were  fine,  jolly  fellows,  no  conven- 
tionality or  nonsense  about  them,  but  they  were 
perfect  dromedaries  with  regard  to  art.  There  was 
not  a  human  being  he  could  talk  with,  and  he  had 
gotten  himself  into  a  slough  of  laziness  and  stag- 
nation which  he  could  not  pull  out  of.  He  never 
had  a  glimmering  of  an  idea  or  a  mood,  and  never 
felt  inspired.  Sometimes  he  was  afraid  that  his  power 
had  run  out,  and  that  he  never  would  do  anything 
any  more.  But  this  could  not  possibly  go  on  for- 


CHAPTER  XI  193 

ever!  It  must  come  back;  he  had  been  too  rich  to 
end  like  this,  and  when  it  came  he  would  show  them 
what  art  was,  those  fellows  who  painted  away  all  the 
time  as  if  they  had  learned  it  by  rote.  For  the  pres- 
ent, however,  he  was  as  if  bewitched,  and  it  would 
be  an  act  of  friendship  if  Niels  would  visit  Mari- 
agerfjord.  They  would  make  him  as  comfortable 
as  circumstances  allowed,  and  he  could  just  as  well 
spend  his  vacation  there  as  any  other  place.  Fen- 
nimore  sent  her  love  and  would  be  glad  to  see  him. 
This  letter  was  so  unlike  Erik  that  Niels  saw  at 
once  there  must  be  something  serious  amiss  or  he 
would  not  complain  in  this  fashion.  He  was  aware, 
too,  of  how  little  volume  there  was  in  the  wellspring 
of  Erik's  production  —  a  slender  stream  only,  which 
unfavorable  circumstances  could  easily  dry  out. 
He  would  go  at  once!  For  all  that  had  happened, 
Erik  should  find  him  a  faithful  friend;  whatever 
the  years  had  loosened  of  old  ties  and  uprooted  of 
old  illusions,  he  would  at  least  know  how  to  guard 
this  old  friendship  of  their  childhood.  He  had 
helped  Erik  before,  and  he  would  help  him  now.  A 
fanaticism  of  friendship  possessed  him.  He  would 
renounce  his  future,  fame,  ambitious  dreams, every- 
thing, for  Erik's  sake.  All  that  he  owned  of  smol- 
dering enthusiasm  and  creative  ferment  should  be 
Erik's;  he  would  merge  himself  in  Erik  with  his 
whole  self  and  all  his  ideas,  holding  nothing  back, 
keeping  nothing  for  himself.  He  dreamed  of  great- 


194  NIELS  LYHNE 

ness  for  the  friend  who  had  torn  his  life  asunder  so 
roughly,  and  saw  himself  blotted  out,  forgotten, 
impoverished,  deprived  of  his  intellectual  heritage; 
and  he  went  on  dreaming  that  his  gift  to  Erik  should 
become  no  longer  a  loan,  but  Erik's  very  own,  as 
he  coined  it  into  works  and  deeds  and  gave  it  his 
stamp.  Erik  in  honor  and  glory,  and  he  himself  one 
of  the  many,  many  commonplace  folk  and  nothing 
else;  poor,  at  last,  by  necessity,  not  by  choice;  a 
real  beggar,  not  a  prince  in  disguise  .  .  .  And  it  was 
sweet  to  dream  himself  so  bitterly  humblej 

But  dreams  are  dreams,  and  he  laughed  at  him- 
self, as  he  thought  that  people  who  neglect  their 
own  work  always  have  no  end  of  time  to  interest 
themselves  in  that  ofothers.lt  also  occurred  to  him 
that,  when  he  came  face  to  face  with  Erik,  the  latter 
would,  of  course,  disclaim  his  letter  and  pass  it  off 
as  a  joke.  He  certainly  would  think  it  extremely 
absurd  if  Niels  were  actually  to  present  himself 
with  the  announcement  that  he  was  ready  to  help 
him  recover  his  creative  power.  Nevertheless  he 
went.  In  his  inmost  heart  he  believed  that  he  could 
do  some  good,  and  no  matter  how  much  he  tried 
to  explain  it  away  or  cast  doubts  upon  it,  he  could 
not  rid  himself  of  the  feeling  that  it  really  was  the 
friendship  of  their  boyhood  which  had  reasserted 
itself  in  all  its  old  simplicity  and  warmth,  in  spite 
of  the  years  and  what  the  years  had  brought. 


CHAPTER  XI  195 

The  villa  at  Mariagerfjord  belonged  to  an  elderly 
couple  who  had  been  forced  by  ill-health  to  make 
their  home  in  the  south  for  an  indefinite  period. 
They  had  not  intended  to  rent  the  place,  as  they 
had  started  out  with  the  idea  of  returning  after  six 
months,  and  therefore  had  left  everything  just  as  it 
was.  So  when  Erik  leased  the  house  fully  furnished, 
this  was  so  literally  true  that  he  got  it  with  bric-a- 
brac,  family  portraits,  and  everything  else,  even  to 
an  attic  full  of  decrepit  furniture  with  old  letters  in 
the  drawers  of  the  secretaries. 

Erik  haddiscovered  the  villa  when  he  left  Fjordby 
after  his  engagement.  As  it  contained  everything 
they  needed,  and  as  he  hoped  to  go  to  Italy  in  a 
year  or  two,  he  had  persuaded  Consul  Claudi  to 
postpone  the  purchase  of  household  furnishings  for 
a  while.  They  had  moved  into  Marianelund  very 
much  as  into  a  hotel,  except  that  they  brought  a  few 
more  trunks  than  travellers  usually  carry. 

The  house  fronted  the  fjord,  less  than  twenty 
feet  from  the  water,  and  was  rather  ordinary  in  ap- 
pearance. It  had  a  balcony  above,  a  veranda  below, 
and  at  the  back  a  young  garden  with  trees  no  thicker 
than  walking-sticks,  but  from  the  garden  one  could 
step  right  into  a  magnificent  bit  of  beech  woods 
with  heathery  glades  and  wide  clefts  opening  be- 
tween banks  of  white  clay,  and  that  made  up  for 
many  shortcomings. 

This  was   Fennimore's   new   home,   and  for  a 


196  NIELS  LYHNE 

while  it  was  as  bright  as  happiness  could  make  it, 
for  they  were  both  young  and  in  love,  strong  and 
healthy,  and  without  a  care  for  their  means  of  sub- 
sistence, either  spiritual  or  material. 

But  every  palace  of  joy  that  rises  heavenward  has 
sand  mixed  in  the  earth  on  which  it  is  founded,  and 
the  sand  will  collect  and  run  away,  slowly  perhaps, 
imperceptibly  perhaps,  but  it  run's  and  runs,  grain 
by  grain.  .  .  .  And  love?  Even  love  is  not  a  rock, 
however  much  we  may  wish  to  believe  it. 

She  loved  him  with  her  whole  soul,  with  the  hot, 
tremulous  passion  born  of  fear.  He  was  to  her  much 
more  than  a  god,  much  nearer  —  he  was  an  idol, 
whom  she  worshipped  without  reason  and  without 
reserve. 

His  love  was  strong  as  hers,  but  it  lacked  the 
fine,  manly  tenderness  that  protects  the  loved  wo- 
man against  herself  and  watches  over  her  dignity. 
Dimly  he  felt  it  as  a  duty,  which  called  him  some- 
times in  a  faint,  low  voice,  but  he  would  not  hear. 
She  was  too  alluring  in  her  blind  love;  her  beauty, 
which  had  the  provocative  luxuriance  and  the  hum- 
ble seductiveness  of  the  female  slave,  incited  him  to 
a  passion  that  knew  neither  bounds  nor  mercy. 

In  the  old  myth  about  Amor, is  it  not  told  some- 
where that  he  puts  his  hand  over  Psyche's  eyes 
before  they  fly  away,  rapturously,  into  the  glowing 
night? 

Poor  Fennimore !  if  she  could  have  been  con- 


CHAPTER  XI  197 

sumed  by  the  fire  of  her  own  heart,  he  who  should 
have  guarded  her  would  have  fanned  the  flames; 
for  he  was  like  that  drunken  monarch  who  swung 
the  Incendiary  torch,  shouting  with  joy  to  see  his 
imperial  city  burn,  intoxicating  himself  with  the 
sight  of  the  leaping  flames,  until  the  ashes  made 
him  sober. 

Poor  Fennimore !  She  did  not  know  that  the 
hymn  of  joy  can  be  sung  so  often  that  both  mel- 
ody and  words  are  lost,  and  nothing  remains  but 
a  twaddle  of  triviality.  She  did  not  know  that  the 
intoxication  which  uplifts  to-day  takes  its  strength 
from  the  wings  of  to-morrow,  and  when  at  length 
sobriety  dawned, gray  and  heavy,  she  realized  trem- 
blingly that  they  had  loved  themselves  down  to  a 
sweet  contempt  for  themselves  and  each  other — a 
sweet  contempt  which  day  by  day  lessened  in  sweet- 
ness and  became,  at  last,  utterly  bitter.  They  turned 
away  from  each  other  as  far  as  they  could;  he,  to 
dream  about  his  betrayed  ideal  of  lofty  coldness 
and  scornful  grace ;  she,  to  gaze  with  longing  despair 
at  the  dim, quiet  shores  of  her  girlhood  days,  now  so 
immeasurably  far  away.  With  each  day  that  passed, 
it  seemed  harder  to  bear;  shame  burned  madly  in 
her  veins,  and  a  suffocating  disgust  with  herself 
made  everything  seem  wretched  and  hopeless. 
There  was  a  small  deserted  room  containing  noth- 
ing but  the  trunks  she  had  brought  from  home,  and 
there  she  would  often  sit,  hour  after  hour,  until  the 


198  NIELS  LYHNE 

sun  sank  over  the  world  out  there  and  filled  the 
room  with  reddish  light.  There  she  tortured  herself 
with  thoughts  sharper  than  thorns  and  scourged 
herself  with  words  more  stinging  than  whips,  until 
she  was  stupefied  by  misery  and  tried  to  deaden  her 
pain  by  throwing  herself  down  on  the  floor  as  some- 
thing too  full  of  corruption  and  dregs — a  carrion 
of  herself — too  foul  to  be  the  seat  of  a  soul.  Her 
husband's  mistress!  That  thought  was  never  out 
of  her  mind;  with  that  she  threw  herself  in  the 
dust  and  trampled  on  herself;  with  that  she  barred 
every  hope  of  regeneration  and  turned  every  happy 
memory  to  stone. 

Gradually  a  hard,  brutal  indifference  came  over 
her,  and  she  ceased  to  despair,  as  she  had  long 
ceased  to  hope.  Her  heaven  had  fallen,  but  she  did 
not  try  to  raise  the  vault  again  in  her  dreams.  The 
earth  was  good  enough  for  her,  since  she  was  but  of 
earth,  earthy.  She  did  not  hate  Erik,  nor  did  she 
draw  away  from  him.  No,  she  accepted  his  kisses; 
she  despised  herself  too  much  to  repulse  them,  and 
besides,  was  she  not  his  wife  —  his  woman? 

For  Erik,  too,  the  awakening  was  bitter,  al- 
though his  man's  prosaic  common  sense  had  warned 
him  that  some  time  it  must  come.  When  it  really 
came,  however,  when  love  no  longer  gave  boot  for 
every  bane,  and  the  veil  of  gleaming  gold  in  which 
it  had  descended  to  earth  for  him  had  been  wafted 
away,  he  felt  such  a  sinking  of  his  spirits  and  such 


CHAPTER  XI  199 

a  sluggishness  creeping  over  all  his  powers  that  he 
was  angered  and  alarmed.  Feverishly  he  turned  to 
his  work  to  assure  himself  that  he  had  lost  noth- 
ing else  besides  happiness,  but  art  did  not  give  him 
the  answer  he  hoped  for.  He  got  hold  of  some  un- 
lucky ideas  which  he  could  not  do  anything  with 
and  yet  could  not  make  up  his  mind  to  abandon. 
Though  they  refused  to  take  shape,  they  continued 
to  tease  his  mind,  and  prevented  other  ideas  from 
breaking  through  or  absorbing  his  energy.  He  grew 
despondent  and  dissatisfied  and  sank  into  a  moody 
idleness,  since  work  was  so  confoundedly  perverse, 
and  since,  of  course,  he  had  only  to  wait  for  the 
spirit  to  move  him  again.  But  time  passed;  his  talent 
was  still  barren,  and  here  by  the  quiet  fjord  there 
was  nothing  that  could  fructify  it;  nor  were  there 
any  fellow  artists  whose  triumphs  could  spur  him 
on  either  to  emulation  or  to  creative  opposition. 

This  inactivity  grew  unbearable.  He  was  seized 
with  a  violent  craving  to  feel  himself,  no  matter 
how  or  in  what,  and  since  nothing  else  offered,  he 
turned  to  a  crowd  of  older  and  younger  men  about 
the  neighborhood  who  enlivened  the  dulness  of 
country  life  by  such  dissipations  as  their  limited 
fancy  could  invent  and  their  rather  one-sided  taste 
could  savor.  The  kernel  of  their  pleasures  was  al- 
ways drinking  and  cards,  no  matter  whether  the 
shell  enclosing  them  was  called  a  market-day  or  a 
hunt.  Nor  did  it  make  any  particular  difference  that 


200  NIELS  LYHNE 

the  scene  was  occasionally  laid  in  a  small  neighbor- 
ing town,  and  certain  real  or  imagined  business  was 
transacted  with  the  tradesmen  during  the  after- 
noon: for  the  bargain  was  always  closed  at  night 
in  the  tavern,  where  the  discriminating  landlord 
always  showed  persons  of  the  right  stripe  into 
Number  Caveat.  If  there  happened  to  be  strolling 
players  in  town,  the  tradesmen  were  let  go,  for  the 
players  were  more  sociable,  did  not  shy  at  the  bottle, 
and  were  usually  ready  to  undergo  the  miraculous 
—  though  never  quite  successful — cure  of  drink- 
ing"themselves  sober  in  gin  after  getting  drunk  on 
champagne. 

The  leader  of  the  crowd  was  a  hunting  squire 
of  sixty,  and  its  main  stock  was  made  up  of  small 
landowners  and  country  gentlemen  in  the  neigh- 
borhood, though  it  also  included  a  massive  young 
dandy  of  a  brandy-distiller  and  a  white-necked 
tutor,  who  had  not  been  a  tutor  for  twenty  years 
or  more,  but  had  gone  as  a  vagrant  from  house  to 
house  with  a  sealskin  bag  and  an  old  gray  mare, 
which  he  used  to  say  he  had  bought  from  a  horse- 
butcher.  He  was  a  silent  drinker,  a  virtuoso  on  the 
flute,  and  was  supposed  to  know  Arabic.  Among 
those  whom  the  squire  called  his  "staff"  were  also 
a  solicitor,  who  always  had  new  stories  to  tell,  and  a 
doctor,  who  knew  only  a  single  one  from  the  siege 
of  Liibeck  in  the  year  6. 

The  members  of  this  band  were  widely  scattered. 


CHAPTER  XI  201 

and  it  scarcely  ever  happened  that  they  were  all 
together  at  one  time,  but  whenever  any  one  stayed 
away  from  the  company  too  long  the  squire  would 
issue  a  summons  to  the  faithful  to  inspect  the  rene- 
gade's oxen,  which  all  understood  to  mean  that  they 
should  quarter  themselves  upon  the  unfortunate 
man  for  two  or  three  days  and  turn  his  house  upside 
down  with  drinking,  gambling,  and  whatever  rus- 
tic amusements  the  season  afforded.  During  such 
a  punitive  visit,  it  once  happened  that  the  whole 
party  was  snowbound,  and  the  host's  supply  of 
coffee,  rum,  and  sugar  ran  out,  so  that  they  were 
reduced  to  drinking  a  coffee  punch  boiled  of  chi- 
cory, sweetened  with  sirup,  and  strengthened  with 
brandy. 

It  was  a  coarse-grained  crowd  of  boon  compan- 
ions that  Erik  had  fallen  in  with,  but  perhaps 
people  of  such  tremendous  animal  vitality  could 
hardly  find  sufficient  outlet  in  more  civilized  amuse- 
ments, and  their  unfailing  good  humor  and  broad, 
bruin-like  joviality  really  took  away  much  of  the 
grossness.  If  Erik's  talent  had  been  akin  to  that  of 
Brouwer  or  Ostade,  this  choice  band  of  revellers 
would  have  been  a  perfect  gold  mine  to  him.  As  it 
was,  he  got  nothing  out  of  it  except  that  he  enjoyed 
it  very  much,  too  much  in  fact,  for  soon  this  wild 
racketing  became  indispensable  to  him  and  took  up 
nearly  all  his  time.  Now  and  then,  he  would  blame 
himself  for  his  idling  and  vow  to  end  it,  but  when- 


202  NIELS  LYHNE 

ever  he  made  an  attempt  at  working,  the  sense  of 
blankness  and  spiritual  impotence  would  come  over 
him  again  and  drive  him  back  to  the  old  life. 

The  letter  to  Niels  had  been  framed  one  day 
when  his  everlasting  barrenness  had  made  him 
wonder  if  his  talent  had  been  attacked  by  a  wasting 
disease.  As  soon  as  it  was  sent,  he  regretted  it,  and 
hoped  that  Niels  would  let  his  plaint  go  in  at  one 
ear  and  out  at  the  other. 

But  Niels  he  came,  the  knight-errant  of  friend- 
ship personified,  and  was  met  with  that  mixture  of 
rebuff  and  pity  which  knights-errant  in  all  times 
have  encountered  from  those  in  whose  behalf  they 
have  dragged  Rosinante  out  of  her  snug  stable.  As 
Niels  was  tactful,  however,  and  bided  his  time,  Erik 
thawed  before  long,  and  the  old  intimacy  was  soon 
established  between  them;  for  Erik's  need  of  pour- 
ing himself  out  in  complaint  and  confession  had 
grown  into  an  almost  physical  craving. 

One  evening  after  bedtime,  when  Fennimore 
had  retired,  they  sat  over  their  cognac  and  water  in 
the  dark  sitting-room.  Only  the  glow  of  their  cigars 
showed  where  they  were,  and  once  in  a  while,  when 
Niels  leaned  far  back  in  his  chair,  his  upturned  pro- 
file would  stand  out  black  against  the  dark  window- 
pane.  They  had  been  drinking  a  good  deal,  Erik 
especially,  while  they  sat  talking  of  the  time  when 
they  were  boys  at  Lonborggaard.  Now  Fennimore's 
departure  had  made  a  pause  which  neither  of  them 


CHAPTER  XI  203 

seemed  inclined  to  break,  for  their  thoughts  came 
stealing  upon  them  in  a  pleasant  languor,  as  thev 
listened  drowsily  to  the  singing  of  their  blood, 
warm  from  the  cognac. 

"What  fools  we  were  when  we  were  twenty," 
came  Erik's  voice  at  last.  "  God  knows  what  we  ex- 
pected and  how  we  had  got  it  into  our  heads  that 
such  things  w^ere  on  earth.  We  called  them  by  the 
same  names  that  they  bear  in  reality,  but  we  meant 
something  entirely  above  and  beyond  comparison 
with  this  tame  sufficiency  that  we  Ve  got.  There 
isn't  much  to  life,  really.  Do  you  think  sor" 

"  Oh,  I  don't  know;  I  take  it  for  what  it  is  worth. 
We  don't  generally  live  very  much.  Most  of  the 
time  we  only  exist.  If  you  could  get  life  handed  to 
you  in  one  whole  large,  appetizing  cake  that  you 
could  set  your  teeth  in  .  .  .  but  doled  out  in  bits! 
—  no,  it's  not  amusing." 

"  Tell  me,  Niels  —  it 's  only  to  you  I  can  talk  of 
such  absurd  things;  I  don't  know  how  it  is,  but 
you're  so  queer.  Tell  me  —  is  there  anything  in 
your  glass?  All  right!  —  Have  you  ever  thought 
of  death?" 

"  Have  I  ?  Why,  yes.  Have  you  ?  " 

"  I  don't  mean  at  funerals  or  when  a  man  is  sick, 
but  sometimes  when  I  'm  just  sitting  here  comfort- 
ably it  comes  over  me  like  — like  a  despair  simply. 
When  I  sit  here  and  mope  and  don't  do  anything 
and  cant  do  anything,  then  I  actually  feel  the  time 


204  NIELS  LYHNE 

slipping  away  from  me.  Hours  and  weeks  and 
months  rush  past  with  rrothing  in  therr^  and  I  can't 
nail  them  to  the  spot  with  a  piece  of  work.  I  don't 
know  if  you  understand  what  I  mean,  but  I  want 
to  get  hold  of  it  with  something  achieved.  When  I 
paint  a  picture,  the  time  I  use  for  it  remains  mine 
forever;  it  is  n't  lost,  even  though  it 's  past.  I  am 
sick  when  I  think  of  the  days  as  they  go  —  inces- 
santly. And  I  have  nothing,  or  I  can't  get  at  it. 
It's  torture!  I  sometimes  get  into  such  a  rage  that 
I  have  to  get  up  and  walk  the  floor  and  sing  some 
idiotic  thing  to  keep  myself  from  crying,  and  then 
when  I  stop  I  am  almost  mad  to  think  that  the 
time  has  gone  meanwhile, andis  going  while  Ithink, 
and  going  andgoing.Thereis  nothing  more  wretched 
than  to  be  an  artist.  Here  I  am,  strong  and  healthy; 
I  have  eyes  to  see;  my  blood  is  warm  and  red ;  my 
heart  beats,  and  there  is  nothing  the  matter  with 
my  head,  and  I  want  to  work,  but  I  can't.  I  am 
struggling  and  groping  for  something  that  eludes* 
me,  something  that  I  can't  grasp  even  if  I  toil  and 
moil  till  I  sweat  blood.  What  can  a  man  do  for  in- 
spiration or  to  get  an  idea?  It  is  all  one  whether  I 
concentrate  or  whether  I  go  out  and  pretend  I  am 
not  looking  for  anything,  never,  never  anything 
except  the  sense  that  now  Time  is  standing  up  to 
the  waist  in  eternity  and  hauling  in  the  hours,  and 
they  rush  past, twelve  white  and  twelve  black,  never 
stopping,  never  stopping.  What  shall  I  do  ?  What 


CHAPTER  XI  205 

do  people  do  when  they  feel  like  that?  Surely,  I 
can't  be  the  first.  Have  you  nothing  to  suggest  ? " 

"  Travel." 

"  No,  anything  but  that.  What  made  you  think 
of  that?  You  don't  believe  I'm  done  for,  do  you?" 

"Done  for!  No,  but  I  thought  the  new  impres- 
sions— " 

"  The  new  impressions !  Exactly.  Have  you  never 
heard  about  people  who  had  plenty  of  talent  in  their 
first  youth  while  they  were  fresh  and  full  of  hope 
and  plans,  but  when  youth  had  passed  their  talent 
was  gone  too  —  and  never  came  back?" 

They  were  silent  for  a  long  time. 

^^'They  travelled,  Niels,  to  get  new  impressions, 
that  was  their  fixed  idea.  The  south,  the  Orient  — 
it  was  all  in  vain;  it  slid  off  from  them  as  from  a 
looking-glass.  I  have  seen  their  graves  in  Rome  — 
two  of  them,  but  there  are  many,many  others.  One 
of  them  went  mad." 

"  I  have  never  heard  that  about  painters  be- 
fore." 

"It's  true.  What  can  it  be,  do  you  think  ?  A  hid- 
den nerve  that's  given  way  ?  Or  something  we  have 
failed  in  or  sinned  against  in  ourselves,  perhaps  — 
who  knows?  A  soul  is  such  a  fragile  thing,  and  no 
one  knows  how  far  the  soul  extends  in  a  human 
being.  We  ought  to  be  good  to  ourselves —  Niels!" 
His  voice  had  grown  low  and  soft.  "I  have  often 
longed  to  travel,  because  I  felt  so  empty.  You  have 


2o6       .  NIELS  LYHNE 

no  idea  how  I  have  longed  for  it,  but  I  simply  don't 
dare  to,  for  suppose  it  did  n't  help,  and  that  I  was 
one  of  those  people  I  was  telling  you  of.  What 
then!  Think  of  standing  face  to  face  with  the  cer- 
tainty that  I  was  done  for,  did  n't  possess  anything, 
could  n't  do  anything — think  of  it — could  n't  do 
anything!  A  paltry  wretch,  a  cursed  dog  of  a 
cripple,  a  miserable  eunuch!  What  do  you  think 
would  become  of  me?  And  after  all  it  is  not  impos- 
sible. My  first  youth  is  past,  and  as  for  illusions 
and  that  sort  of  thing,  I  can  assure  you  I  have  n't 
many  left.  It's  terrible  how  we  go  through  them, 
and  yet  I  was  never  one  of  those  who're  anxious  to 
get  rid  of  them.  I  was  not  like  you  and  the  rest  of 
the  people  who  used  to  foregather  at  Mrs.  Boye's 
—  you  were  always  so  busy  plucking  the  fine  feath- 
ers from  one  another,  and  the  balder  you  got,  the 
more  you  crowed.  Still  what's  the  difference — 
sooner  or  later  we  all  start  molting." 

They  were  silent  again.  The  air  was  bitter  with 
cigar  smoke  and  heavy  with  cognac,  and  they  sighed 
drearily,  oppressed  by  the  stuffiness  of  the  room 
and  by  their  own  very  sad  hearts. 

Niels  had  travelled  two  hundred  miles  to  bring 
aid,  and  here  he  sat  feeling  his  impulse  putto  shame, 
while  the  colder  side  of  his  nature  looked  on.  For 
what  could  he  do, when  it  came  to  the  point.^  What 
if  he  tried  to  talk  picturesquely  to  Erik,  in  many 
words  of  purple  and  ultramarine,  dripping  with 


CHAPTER  XI  207 

light  and  wading  i n  sKadow !  There  had  been  a  dream 
of  something  Hke  that  in  his  brain  when  he  started 
out.  How  utterly  absurd !  To  bring  aid !  You  might 
perhaps  drive  away  the  goddess  with  the  closed 
hands  from  an  artist's  door,  but  that  was  certainly 
the  utmost;  you  could  no  more  help  him  to  create 
than  you  could  help  him,  if  he  were  paralyzed,  to 
lift  his  little  finger  by  his  own  strength.  No,  not 
though  your  heart  overflowed  with  affection  and 
sympathy  and  devotion  and  everything  else  that 
was  generous.  .  .  .  What  you  ought  to  do  was  to 
mind  your  own  afl^airs ;  that  was  useful  and  healthy, 
but  of  course  it  was  easier  to  let  your  heart  run 
amuck  in  a  large  and  generous  way.  The  only 
trouble  was  that  it  was  so  lamentably  impracticable  , 
and  so  utterly  ineffective.  Minding  your  own  affairs 
and  doing  it  well  did  not  insure  you  paradise,  but 
at  least  you  did  not  have  to  cast  down  your  eyes 
before  either  God  or  man. 

Opportunity  was  abundant  for  Niels  to  make 
melancholy  reflections  on  the  impotence  of  a  kind 
heart,  for  all  that  he  accomplished  was  to  keep  Erik 
at  home  a  little  more  than  usual  for  a  month  or  so. 
Nevertheless,  he  did  not  care  to  return  to  Copen- 
hagen during  the  hot  season,  and  as  he  did  not  wish 
to  remain  a  guest  indefinitely,  he  engaged  a  room 
with  a  family  a  little  above  the  peasant  class,  on  the 
opposite  shore  of  the  fjord,  so  near  that  he  could 
row  over  to  Marianelund  in  fifteen  minutes.  Now 


2o8  NIELS  LYHNE 

that  he  was  accustomed  to  the  neighborhood,  he 
would  just  as  lief  stay  there  as  any  other  place,  for 
he  was  one  of  the  susceptible  people  over  whom  out- 
ward surroundings  easily  acquire  a  hold.  Besides, 
his  friend  and  his  cousin  Fennimore  were  there,  and 
that  was  reason  enough,  especially  as  there  was  not 
a  human  being  anywhere  else  expecting  him. 

During  the  trip  from  Copenhagen,  he  had  care- 
fully thought  out  his  behavior  to  Fennimore  and 
how  he  would  show  her  that  he  had  forgotten  so 
completely  that  he  did  not  remember  there  was 
anything  to  forget;  above  all,  no  coldness,  but  a 
friendly  indifference,  a  superficial  cordiality,  a  polite 
sympathy;  that  was  the  proper  attitude. 

But  it  was  all  thrown  away. 

The  Fennimore  he  met  was  a  different  person 
from  the  one  he  had  left.  She  was  still  lovely;  her 
form  was  luxuriant  and  beautiful  as  before,  and  she 
had  the  same  slow, languid  movements  that  charmed 
him  in  former  days,  but  there  was  a  dreary  thought- 
lessness in  the  expression  of  her' mouth  as  of  one 
who  had  thought  too  much,  and  a  pitiful,  tortured 
cruelty  in  her  gentle  eyes.  He  did  not  understand 
it  at  all,  but  one  fact  was  at  least  clear,  and  that 
was  that  she  had  had  other  things  to  think  of  than 
remembering  him,  and  that  she  was  quite  callous 
to  any  memories  he  could  awaken.  She  looked  like 
one  who  had  made  her  choice  and  done  the  worst 
she  could  do  with  it. 


CHAPTER  XI  209 

Little  by  little,  he  began  to  spell  and  put  things 
together,  and  one  day,  when  they  were  walking 
along  the  shore,  he  began  to  understand. 

Erik  was  cleaning  up  his  studio,  and  as  they 
were  strolling  by  the  water,  the  maid  came  out  with 
an  apronful  of  refuse  which  she  threw  on  the  beach. 
There  was  a  litter  of  old  brushes,  fragments  of  casts, 
broken  palette  knives,  bits  of  oil  bottles,  and  empty 
paint  tubes.  Niels  poked  the  heap  with  his  foot, 
and  Fennimore  looked  on  with  the  vague  curiosity 
people  often  feel  in  turning  over  old  rubbish.  Sud- 
denly Niels  drew  his  foot  away  as  if  something  had 
burned  it,  but  caught  himself  as  quickly,  and  gave 
the  pile  another  kick. 

"  Oh,  let  me  see  it,"  begged  Fennimore,  and  put 
her  hand  on  his  arm  as  if  to  stop  him. He  bent  down 
and  pulled  outa  plaster  cast  ofa  hand  holdingan  egg. 

"It  must  be  a  mistake,"  he  said. 

"Why  no,  it  is  broken,"  she  replied  quietly,  as 
she  took  it  from  him.  "See,  the  forefinger  is  gone," 
she  added,  pointing,  but  when  she  suddenly  became 
aware  that  the  egg  had  been  cut  in  two  and  a  yolk 
painted  inside  it  with  chrome  yellow,  she  blushed, 
and,  bending  down,  she  slowly  and  deliberately 
knocked  the  hand  against  a  stone,  until  it  was 
broken  into  little  bits. 

"  Do  you  remember  the  time  it  was  cast? "  Niels 
asked,  in  order  to  say  something. 

"I  remember  that  my  hand  was  smeared  with 


210  NIELS  LYHNE 

green  soap  so  the  plaster  should  not  stick  to  it.  Is 
that  what  you  were  thinking  of?" 

"  No,  I  mean  the  time  when  Erik  passed  the  cast 
around  at  the  tea-table.  Don't  you  remember, when 
it  came  to  your  old  aunt,  how  her  eyes  filled  with 
tears,  and  she  embraced  you  with  the  deepest  com- 
passion and  kissed  you  on  the  brow,  as  if  some 
harm  had  been  done  to  you?" 

"Yes,  people  are  so  sensitive." 

"  No,  we  all  laughed  at  her, but  there  was  a  delicacy 
in  it  nevertheless,  although  it  was  so  nonsensical." 

"Yes,  there  is  much  of  that  nonsensical  delicacy 
in  the  world." 

"  I  believe  you  want  to  quarrel  with  me  to-day." 

"No,  I  don't,  but  there  is  something  I  want  to 
say  to  you.  You  won't  take  offence  at  a  little  frank- 
ness?— Well,  then  —  suppose  a  man  tells  a  story 
that  is  not  very  nice  in  his  wife's  presence  and  per- 
haps otherwise  shows  what  appears  to  you  a  lack 
of  consideration  for  her;  don't  you  think  it  is  un- 
necessary for  you  then  to  express  your  protest  by 
your  emphatic  fastidiousness  and  your  exceeding 
great  chivalry?  It  is  fair  to  assume  that  the  man 
knows  his  own  wife  best,  and  knows  that  it  won't 
offend  or  wound  her;  otherwise  he  would  not  do 
it.  Is  not  that  true?" 

"No,  it  is  not  true,  generally  speaking,  but  in 
this  case,  and  on  your  authority,  I  don't  mind  say- 
ing yes." 


CHAPTER  XI  211 

"That's  right.  You  may  be  sure  that  women  are 
not  the  ethereal  creatures  many  a  good  youth 
fancies;  they  are  really  no  more  delicate  than  men, 
and  not  very  different  from  them.  Take  my  word 
for  it,  there  has  been  some  filthy  clay  used  in  the 
shaping  of  them  both." 

"Dearest  Fennimore!  Thank  God  you  don't 
know  what  you  are  saying,  but  you  are  very  unjust 
to  women  and  to  yourself.  /  believe  in  woman's    N< 
purity." 

"  Woman's  purity !  What  do  you  mean  by  wo- 
man's purity?" 

"I  mean  —  that  is — " 

"  You  mean  —  I  will  tell  you  ;  you  mean  nothing, 
for  that  is  another  piece  of  nonsensical  delicacy. 
A  woman  can't  be  pure,  and  is  n't  supposed  to  be 

—  how  could  she?  It  is  against  nature!  And  do 
you  think  God  made  her  to  be  pure?  Answer  me! 

—  No,  and  ten  thousand  times  no.  Then  why  this 
lunacy !  Why  fling  us  up  to  the  stars  with  one  hand,  \ 
when  you  have  to  pull  us  down  with  the  other!   \ 
Can't  you  let  us  walk  the  earth  by  your  side,  one 
human  being  with  another,  and  nothing  more  at  all?       1 
It  is  impossible  for  us  to  step  firmly  on  the  prose 

of  life  when  you  blind  us  with  your  poetic  will- 
o'-the-wisps.  Let  us  alone!  For  God's  sake,  let  us 
alone!" 

She  sat  down  and  wept. 

Niels  understood  much.  Fennimore  would  have 


i     212  NIELS  LYHNE 

I  been  miserable  had  she  known  how  much.  Was  it 
not  partly  the  old  story  of  love 's  holiday  fare  which 
refuses  to  turn  into  daily  bread,  but  goes  on  being 
holiday  fare,  only  more  tasteless,  more  insipid,  and 
less  nourishing,  day  by  day?  One  can't  perform  a 
miracle,  and  the  other  can't  perform  it,  and  there 
they  sit  in  their  banqueting  clothes,  careful  to  smile 
and  to  use  festive  words,  but  underneath  they  feel 
the  agony  of  hunger  and  thirst,  while  their  eyes 
shrink  from  each  other,  and  hatred  begins  to  grow 
in  their  hearts.  Was  not  that  the  first  chapter,  and 
was  not  the  other  the  equally  dreary  tale  of  a  wo- 
man's despair  at  not  being  able  to  recover  herself 
V  after  finding  out  that  the  demigod,  whose  bride  she 
became  so  joyously,  was  only  an  ordinary  mortal? 
First  the  despair,  the  bootless  despair,  and  then  the 
j  merciful  stupor — that  must  be  the  explanation.  It 
seemed  to  Niels  that  he  understood  everything: 
the  hardness  in  her,  the  dreary  humility,  and  her 
coarseness,  which  was  the  bitterest  drop  in  the 
whole  goblet.  By  degrees  he  came  to  see  also  that 
his  delicacy  and  deferential  homage  must  oppress 
and  irritate  her,  because  a  woman  who  has  been 
hurled  from  the  purple  couch  of  her  dreams  to  the 
pavement  below  will  quickly  resent  any  attempt  to 
spread  carpets  over  the  stones  which  she  longs  to 
feel  in  all  their  hardness.  In  her  first  despair  she  is 
not  satisfied  to  tread  the  path  with  herfeet:  she  is  de- 
termined to  crawl  it  on  her  knees,  choosing  the  way 


CHAPTER  XI  ai-^ 

that  is  steepest  and  roughest.  Shedesires  no  helping 
hand  and  will  not  lift  her  head — let  it  sink  down 
with  its  own  heaviness,  so  that  she  may  put  her  face 
to  the  ground  and  taste  the  dust  with  her  tongue ! 
!  Niels  pitied  her  with  all  his  heart,  but  he  left  her 
alone  as  she  desired. 

It  was  hard  to  look  on  and  not  help,  to  sit  apart 
and  dream  her  happy,  in  stupid  dreams,  or  to  wait 
and  calculate,  with  the  cold  knowledge  of  the  physi- 
cian, how  long  she  had  to  suffer.  He  told  himself, 
in  this  dreary  wisdom,  that  there  could  be  no  re- 
lief until  her  old  hope  in  the  fair,  gleaming  treas- 
ures of  life  had  bled  to  death  and  a  more  sluggish 
stream  had  entered  her  veins,  making  her  dull 
enough  to  forget,  blunt  enough  to  accept,  and,  at 
last,  at  last,  coarse  enough  to  rejoice  in  the  thick 
atmosphere  of  a  bliss  many  heavens  lower  than  that 
which  she  had  meekly  hoped  and  humbly  prayed 
for  wings  to  reach.  —  He  was  full  of  disgust  with 
all  the  world  when  he  thought  that  she,  to  whom 
he  had  once  knelt  in  adoration,  had  come  to  such 
a  pass  that  she  had  been  forced  to  a  slave's  estate, 
and  stood  at  the  gate  shivering  with  cold,  while  he 
rode  past  on  his  high  horse  with  the  large  coins  of 
life  jingling  in  his  pocket. 

One  Sunday  afternoon,  in  the  latter  part  of 
August,  Niels  rowed  across  the  fjord.  Fennimore 
was  at  home  alone  when  he  came;  he  found  her 
lying  on  a  sofa  in  the  corner  room,  and  very  miser- 


'^.14  NIELS  LYHNE 

able.  Her  breath  came  with  that  low,  monotonous 
moaning  which  seems  to  afford  rehef  from  pain,  and 
she  said  that  she  had  a  frightful  headache.  There 
was  no  one  to  help  her,  for  she  had  given  the  maid 
leave  to  go  home  to  Hadssund,  and  soon  after- 
ward some  one  had  come  and  carried  off  Erik;  she 
could  not  understand  where  they  had  gone  in  the 
rain.  Now  she  had  been  lying  there  for  two  hours 
trying  to  sleep,  but  it  was  impossible,  the  pain  was 
so  bad.  She  had  never  had  it  before,  and  it  had  come 
on  so  suddenly — at  dinner-time  there  had  been 
nothing  the  matter.  First  it  was  in  the  temples,  and 
then  it  seemed  to  dig  deeper  and  deeper  and  deeper 
in ;  now  it  seemed  to  be  behind  her  eyes — if  it  only 
was  not  anything  dangerous.  She  was  not  used  to 
being  ill,  and  was  very  frightened  and  unhappy. 

Niels  comforted  her  as  well  as  he  could,  telling 
her  to  lie  still,  close  her  eyes,  and  not  speak.  He 
found  a  heavy  shawl,  which  he  wrapped  around  her 
feet,  fetched  vinegar  from  the  buffet,  and  made  a 
cold  compress,  which  he  laid  on  her  brow.  Then  he 
sat  down  quietly  by  the  window,  and  looked  out  at 
the  rain. 

From  time  to  time,  he  stole  over  to  her  on  tip- 
toe and  changed  the  compress  without  speaking, 
merely  nodding  to  her,  as  she  looked  up  at  him 
gratefully  between  his  hands.  Sometimes  she  wanted 
to  speak,  but  he  hushed  her  with  a  look,  shaking 
his  head,  and  returned  to  his  seat  again. 


CHAPTER  XI         .  215 

At  last  she  fell  asleep. 

One  hour  passed  and  another,  and  she  was  still 
sleeping.  Slowly  one  quarter  slipped  into  the  other, 
while  the  melancholy  daylight  faded,  and  the  shad- 
ows in  the  room  waxed  larger,  as  if  they  were 
growing  out  of  the  furniture  and  the  walls.  Outside 
the  rain  fell,  evenly  and  steadily,  blotting  out  every 
other  sound  in  its  low,  incessant  patter. 

She  was  still  sleeping. 

The  fumes  of  the  vinegar  and  the  vanilla  scent 
of  the  heliotrope,  mingling  in  a  pungent  odor  like 
wine,  filled  the  room.  Warmed  by  their  breath,  the 
air  covered  the  gray  window-panes  with  a  dewy 
film,  which  grew  denser  with  the  increasing  cool- 
ness of  the  evening. 

By  this  time,  he  was  far  away  in  memories  and 
dreams,  though  a  part  of  his  consciousness  still 
watched  over  the  sleeper  and  followed  her  sleep. 
Gradually,  as  the  darkness  pressed  in,  his  fancy 
wearied  of  feeding  these  dreams  that  flickered  up 
and  died  down,  just  as  the  soil  gets  tired  of  bringing 
forth  the  same  crop  again  and  again ;  and  the  dreams 
grew  feebler,  more  sterile,  and  stiffer,  losing  the  \ 
luxuriant  details  that  had  entwined  them  like  long  } 
shoots  of  clinging  vines.  His  thoughts  left  the  dis- 
ta.nce  and  came  homing  back.  —  How  quiet  every- 
thing was !  Was  it  not  as  if  they  were  together,  he 
and  she,  on  an  island  of  silence  rising  above  the 
monotonous  sea  of  sound  made  by  the  soft  patter 


2i6  NIELS  LYHNE 

of  the  rain?  And  their  souls  were  still,  calm  and  safe, 
while  the  future  seemed  to  slumber  in  a  cradle  of 
peace. 

Would  that  it  might  never  awaken,  and  that  all 
might  remain  as  now  —  no  more  happiness  than 
that  of  peace,  but  neither  any  misery  nor  irking 
unrest!  Would  that  the  present  might  close  as  a 
bud  closes  around  itself,  and  that  no  spring  would 
follow ! 

Fennimore  called.  She  had  been  lying  awake  for 
some  time,  too  happy  in  being  free  from  pain  to 
think  of  speaking.  Now  she  wanted  to  get  up  and 
light  the  lamp,  but  Niels  continued  to  act  as  physi- 
cian, and  compelled  her  to  lie  still.  It  was  not  good 
for  her  to  get  up  yet;  he  had  matches  and  could 
easily  find  the  lamp. 

When  he  had  lit  it,  he  put  it  on  the  flower  stand 
in  the  corner,  where  its  milky  white  globe  shone 
softly  veiled  by  the  delicate,  slumbering  leaves  of 
an  acacia.  The  room«was  just  light  enough  so  that 
they  could  see  each  other's  face. 

He  sat  down  in  front  of  her,  and  they  spoke 
about  the  rain  and  said  how  lucky  it  was  that  Erik 
had  taken  his  rain-coat,  and  how  wet  poor  Trine 
would  be.  Then  their  conversation  came  to  a  stand- 
still. 

Fennimore 's  thoughts  were  not  quite  awake  yet, 
and  in  her  weakness  it  seemed  pleasant  to  lie  thus 
musing  without  speaking.  Nor  was  Niels  inclined 


CHAPTER  XI  217 

to  talk,  for  he  was  still  under  the  spell  of  the  after- 
noon's long  silence. 

"  Do  you  like  this  house?  "  Fennimore  asked  at 
last. 

"Why  yes,  fairly  well." 

"Really?  Do  you  remember  the  furniture  at 
home?" 

"At  Fjordby?  Yes  indeed,  perfectly." 

"You  don't  know  how  I  love  it,  and  how  I  long 
for  it  sometimes.  The  things  we  have  here  don't 
belong  to  us  —  they  are  only  rented — and  have 
no  association  with  anything,  and  we  are  not  going 
to  live  with  them  any  longer  than  we  stay  in  this 
place.  You  may  think  it  queer,  but  I  assure  you, 
I  often  feel  lonely  here  among  all  these  strange 
pieces  of  furniture  that  stand  around  here  so  in- 
different and  stupid  and  take  me  for  what  I  am 
without  caring  the  least  bit  about  me.  And  as  I 
know  they  are  not  going  with  me  —  that  they  will 
just  stay  here  and  be  rented  by  other  people — I 
can't  get  fond  of  them  or  interested  in  them  as  I 
should  if  I  knew  that  my  home  would  always  be 
theirs,  and  that  whatever  came  to  me.  of  good  or 
ill  would  come  in  the  midst  of  them.  Do  you  think 
it  childish?  Perhaps  it  is,  but  I  can't  help  it." 

"  I  don't  know  what  it  is,  but  I  have  felt  it  too. 
When  I  was  left  alone  abroad,  my  watch  stopped, 
and  when  it  came  back  from  the  watchmaker  and 
was  going  as  before,  it  was — just  what  you  mean. 


21 8  NIELS  LYHNE 

I  liked  the  feeling;  there  was  something  peculiar 
about  itj  something  genuinely  good." 

"Yes  indeed !  Oh,  I  should  have  kissed  it,  if  I 
had  been  you." 

"Would  you?" 

"Do  you  know,"  she  said  suddenly,  "you  have 
never  told  me  anything  about  Erik  as  a  boy  ?  What 
was  he  like.^" 

"Everything  that  is  good  and  fine,  Fennimore. 
Splendid,  brave  —  a  boy's  ideal  of  a  boy,  not  exactly 
a  mother's  or  a  teacher's  ideal,  but  the  other,  which 
is  so  much  better." 

"How  did  you  get  along  together?  Were  you 
very  fond  of  each  other?" 

"  Yes,  I  was  in  love  with  him,  and  he  did  n't  mind 
—  that  is  about  how  it  was.  We  were  very  different. 
I  always  wanted  to  be  a  poet  and  become  famous, 
but  what  do  you  suppose  he  said  he  wanted  to  be, 
one  day  when  I  asked  him?  —  An  Indian,  a  real  red 
Indian  with  war  paint  and  all  the  rest!  I  remember 
that  I  couldn't  understand  it  at  all.  It  was  incom- 
prehensible to  me  how  any  one  could  want  to  be  a 
savage  —  civilized  creature  that  I  was!" 

"  But  was  it  not  strange,  then,  that  he  should 
become  an  artist?"  said  Fennimore,  and  there  was 
something  cold  and  hostile  in  her  tone,  as  she 
asked. 

Niels  noticed  it  with  a  Httle  start.  "Not  at  all," 
he  answered;  "it  is  really  rare  that  people  become 


CHAPTER  XI  219 

artists  with  the  whole  of  their  nature.  And  such 
strong  fellows  overflowing  with  vitality  like  Erik 
often  have  an  unutterable  longing  for  what  is  fine- 
grained and  delicate:  for  an  exquisite  virginal  cold- 
ness, a  lofty  sweetness  —  I  hardly  know  how  to 
express  it.  Outwardly  they  may  be  robust  and  full- 
blooded  enough,  even  coarse,  and  no  one  suspects 
what  strange,  romantic,  sentimental  secrets  they  i 
carry  about  with  them,  because  they  are  so  bash- 
ful—  spiritually  bashful,  I  mean — that  no  pale 
little  maiden  can  be  more  shy  about  her  soul  than 
are  these  big,  hard-stepping  menfolks.  Don't  you 
understand,  Fennimore,  that  such  a  secret,  which 
can't  be  told  in  plain  words  right  out  in  common 
every-day  air,  may  dispose  a  man  to  be  an  artist? 
And  they  can't  express  it  in  words,  they  simply 
can't;  we  have  to  believe  that  it  is  there  and  lives 
its  quiet  life  within  them,  as  the  bulb  lives  in  the 
earth;  for  once  in  a  while  they  do  send  fragrant, 
delicately  tinted  flowers  up  to  the  light.  Do  you 
understand?  —  Don't  demand  anything  for  your- 
self of  this  blossoming  strength,  believe  in  it,  be 
glad  to  nourish  it  and  to  know  that  it  is  there. — 
Forgive  me,  Fennimore,  but  it  seems  to  me  that  ^  / 
you  and  Erik  are  not  really  good  to  each  other.  \ 
Can't  you  make  a  change?  Don't  think  of  who  is 
right  or  how  great  the  wrong  is,  and  don't  treat  him 
according  to  his  deserts  —  how  would  even  the  best 
of  us  fare  if  we  got  our  deserts!  No,  think  of  him 


220  NIELS  LYHNE 

as  he  was  in  the  hour  when  you  loved  him  most; 
believe  me,  he  is  worthy  of  it.  You  must  not 
measure  and  weigh.  There  are  moments  in  love,  I 
know,  full  of  bright,  solemn  ecstasy,  when  we 
would  give  our  lives  for  the  beloved  if  need  be.  Is 
not  that  true?  Remember  it  now,  Fennimore,  for 
his  sake  and  your  own.'* 

He  was  silent. 

She  said  nothing  either,  but  lay  very  still  with  a 
melancholy  smile  on  her  lips,  pale  as  a  flower. 

Then  she  half  rose  and  stretched  out  her  hand 
to  Niels.  "Will  you  be  my  friend?"  she  asked. 

"  I  am  your  friend,  Fennimore,"  and  he  took  her 
hand. 

"Will  you,  Niels?" 

"Always,"  he  replied,  lifting  the  hand  to  his  lips 
reverently. 

When  he  rose,  it  seemed  to  Fennimore  that  he 
held  himself  more  erect  than  she  had  ever  seen  him 
before. 

A  little  later  Trine  came  in  to  announce  her  re- 
turn, and  then  there  was  tea,  and  at  last  the  rowing 
back  through  the  dreary  rain. 

Toward  morning  Erik  came  home,  and  when 
Fennimore  saw  him  by  the  cold,  truthful  light  of 
dawn,  preparing  to  go  to  bed,  heavy  and  unsteady 
with  drink,  his  eyes  glazed  from  gambling  and  his 
face  dirty-pale  after  the  sleepless  night,  then  all  the 
fair  words  Niels  had  spoken  seemed  to  her  quite 


CHAPTER  XI  221 

visionary.  The  bright  promises  she  had  made  to 
her  own  heart  fainted  and  paled  before  the  oncom- 
ing day  —  vapory  dreams  and  fumes  of  fancy:  a 
fairy  flock  of  lies  ! 

What  was  the  use  of  struggling  with  this  weight 
dragging  them  both  downP  It  was  futile  to  lighten 
it  by  lies;  their  life  would  never  have  its  old  buoy- 
ancy. The  frost  had  been  there,  and  the  wealth  of 
vines  and  creepers  and  clustering  roses  and  blos- 
soms fairer  than  roses  that  had  entwined  them  had 
shed  every  tiny  leaf,  lost  every  blossom,  and  noth- 
ing remained  but  the  tough,  naked  withes  binding 
them  together  in  an  unbreakable  tether.  What  did 
it  avail  that  she  roused  the  feelings  of  former  days 
to  an  artificial  life  by  the  warmth  of  memories,  that 
she  put  her  idol  up  on  its  pedestal  again,  that  she 
called  back  the  light  of  admiration  to  her  eyes,  the 
words  of  adoration  to  her  lips,  and  the  flush  of  hap- 
piness to  her  cheeks !  What  did  it  all  avail,  when  he 
would  not  take  upon  himself  to  be  the  priest  of  the 
idol  and  so  help  her  to  a  pious  fraud?  He !  He  did 
not  even  remember  her  love.  Not  one  of  her  words 
echoed  in  his  ears,  not  one  of  all  their  days  was 
hidden  in  his  soul. 

No,  dead  and  cold  was  the  ardent  love  of  their 
hearts.  The  fragrance,  the  glamor,  and  the  tremu- 
lous tones  —  all  had  been  wafted  away.  There  they 
sat,  from  force  of  habit,  he  with  his  arm  around  her 
waist,  she  with  her  head  resting  on   his  shoulder, 


222  NIELS  LYHNE 

drearily  sunk  in  silence,  forgetting  each  other;  she, 
to  remember  the  glorious  hero  he  had  never  been  ; 
he,  to  transform  her  in  his  dreams  to  the  ideal  which 
he  now  always  saw  shining  in  the  sky  high  above 
her  head.  Such  was  their  life  together,  and  the  days 
came  and  went  without  bringing  any  change,  and 
day  after  day  they  gazed  out  over  the  desert  of 
their  lives,  and  told  themselves  that  it  was  a  desert, 
that  there  were  no  flowers  nor  any  hope  of  flowers 
or  springs  or  green  palms. 

As  the  autumn  advanced, »Erik's  drinking-bouts 
became  more  frequent.  What  was  the  use,  he  said 
to  Niels,  of  sitting  at  home  waiting  for  ideas  that 
never  came,  until  his  thoughts  turned  to  stone  in 
his  head?  Moreover,  he  did  not  get  much  comfort 
from  Niels's  society;  he  needed  people  with  some 
grit  in  them,  people  of  lusty  flesh  and  blood,  not 
a  whim-wham  of  delicate  nerves.  Niels  and  Fen- 
nimore  were  therefore  left  much  alone,  for  Niels 
came  over  to  Marianelund  every  day. 

The  covenant  of  friendship  they  had  made  and 
the  talk  they  had  had  on  that  Sunday  afternoon  put 
them  at  their  ease  with  each  other,  and,  lonely  as 
they  both  were,  they  drew  closer  together  in  a  warm 
and  tender  friendship,  which  soon  gained  a  strong 
hold  over  both.  It  absorbed  them  so  that  their 
thoughts,  whether  they  were  together  or  apart, 
always  turned  to  this  bond,  as  birds  building  the 
same  nest  look  on  everything  theygatherorpass  by 


CHAPTER  XI  223 

with  the  one  pleasant  goal  of  making  the  nest  snug 
and  comfortable  for  each  other  and  themselves. 

If  Niels  came  while  Erik  was  away,  they  nearly 
always,  even  on  rainy  and  stormy  days,  took  long 
walks  in  the  woods  behind  the  garden.  They  had 
fallen  in  love  with  that  forest,  and  grew  fonder  of 
it  as  they  watched  the  summer  life  die  out.  There 
were  a  thousand  things  to  see.  First,  how  the  leaves 
turned  yellow  and  red  and  brown,  then  how  they 
fell  off,  whirling  on  a  windy  day  in  yellow  swarms, 
or  softly  rustling  in  still  air,  single  leaf  after  leaf, 
down  against  the  stiff  boughs  and  between  the 
pliant  brown  twigs.  And  when  the  leaves  fell  from 
trees  and  bushes,  the  hidden  secrets  of  summer 
were  revealed  in  nest  upon  nest.  What  treasures  on 
the  ground  and  on  the  branches,  dainty  seeds  and 
bright-colored  berries,  brown  nuts,  shining  acorns 
and  exquisite  acorn  cups,  tassels  of  coral  on  the 
barberry,  polished  black  berries  on  the  buckthorn, 
and  scarlet  urns  on  the  dog-rose.  The  bare  beeches 
were  finely  dotted  with  prickly  beechnuts,  and  the 
roan  bent  under  the  weight  of  its  red  clusters,  acid  in 
fragrance  like  apple  cider.  Late  brambleberries  lay 
black  and  brown  among  the  wet  leaves  at  the  way- 
side; red  whortleberries  grew  among  the  heather, 
and  the  wild  raspberries  brought  forth  their  dull 
crimson  fruit  for  the  second  time.  The  ferns  turned 
all  colors  as  they  faded,  and  the  moss  was  a  reve- 
lation, not  only  the  deep,  luscious   moss  in  the 


224  NIELS  LYHNE 

hollows  and  on  the  slopes,  but  the  faint,  delicate 
growth  on  the  tree-trunks,  resembling  what  one 
might  imagine  the  cornfields  of  the  elves  to  be  as  it 
sent  forth  the  finest  of  stalks  with  dark  brown  buds 
like  ears  of  corn  at  the  tip. 

They  scoured  the  forest  from  end  to  end,  eager 
to  find  all  its  treasures  and  marvels.  They  had 
divided  it  between  them  as  children  do;  the  part  on 
one  side  of  the  road  was  Fennimore's  property,  and 
that  on  the  other  side  was  Niels's,  and  they  would 
compare  their  realms  and  quarrel  about  which  was 
the  more  glorious.  Everything  there  had  names  — 
clefts  and  hillocks,  paths  and  stiles,  ditches  and 
pools;  and  when  they  found  a  particularly  magni- 
ficent tree,  they  gave  that  too  a  name.  In  this  way 
they  took  complete  possession  and  created  a  little 
world  of  their  own  which  no  one  else  knew  and  no 
one  else  was  at  home  in,  and  yet  they  had  no  secret 
which  all  the  world  might  not  have  heard. 

As  yet  they  had  not. 

But  love  was  in  their  hearts,  and  was  not  there, 
as  the  crystals  are  present  in  a  saturated  solution, 
and  yet  are  not  present,  not  until  a  splinter  or  the 
merest  particle  of  the  right  matter  is  thrown  into 
the  solution,  releasing  the  slumbering  atoms  as  if 
by  magic,  and  they  rush  to  meet  one  another,  join- 
ing and  riveting  themselves  together  according  to 
unsearchable  laws,  and  in  the  same  instant  there 
is  crystal — crystal. 


CHAPTER  XI  225 

So  it  was  a  trifle  that  made  them  feel  they  loved. 

There  is  nothing  to  tell.  It  was  a  day  like  all 
other  days,  when  they  were  alone  together  in  the 
sitting-room,  as  they  had  been  a  hundred  times 
before;  their  conversation  was  about  things  of  no 
moment,  and  that  which  happened  was  outwardly 
as  common  and  as  every-day-like  as  possible.  It 
was  nothing  except  that  Niels  stood  looking  out 
of  the  window,  and  Fennimore  came  over  to  him 
and  looked  out  too. That  was  all,  but  it  was  enough, 
for  in  a  flash  like  lightning,  the  past  and  present 
and  future  were  transformed  for  Niels  Lyhne  by 
the  consciousness  that  he  loved  the  woman  stand- 
ing by  his  side,  not  as  anything  bright  and  sweet 
and  happy  and  beautiful  that  would  lift  him  to 
ecstasy  or  rapture — such  was  not  the  nature  of  his 
love — but  he  loved  her  as  something  he  could  no^ 
more  do  without  than  the  breath  of  life  itself,  and 
he  reached  out,  as  a  drowning  man  clutches,  and 
pressed  her  hand  to  his  heart. 

She  understood  him.  With  almost  a  scream,  in 
a  voice  full  of  terror  and  agony,  she  cried  out  to 
him  an  answer  and  a  confession :  "  Oh, yes,  Niels !  '* 
and  snatched  away  her  hand  in  the  same  instant. 
A  moment  she  stood,  pale  and  shrinking,  then  sank 
down  with  one  knee  in  an  upholstered  chair,  hiding 
her  face  against  the  harsh  velvet  of  the  back,  and 
sobbed  aloud. 

Niels  stood  a  few  seconds  as  though  blinded. 


226  NIELS  LYHNE 

groping  around  among  the  bulb-glasses  for  sup- 
port. It  was  only  for  a  very  few  seconds;  then  he 
stepped  over  to  the  chair  where  she  was  lying,  and 
bent  over  without  touching  her,  resting  one  hand 
on  the  back  of  the  chair. 

"Don't  be  so  unhappy,  Fennimore !  Look  up 
and  let  us  talk  about  it.  Will  you,  or  will  you  not? 
Don't  be  afraid !  Let  us  bear  it  together,  my  own 
love !  Come,  try  if  you  can't !  " 

She  raised  her  head  slightly  and  looked  up  at 
him.  "Oh,  God,  what  shall  we  do!  Isn't  it  terri- 
ble, Niels!  Why  should  such  a  thing  happen  to 
me?  And  how  lovely  it  all  could  have  been  —  so 
happy!"  and  she  sobbed  again. 

"  Should  I  not  have  spoken? "  he  moaned."  Poor 
Fennimore,  would  you  rather  never  have  known 
it?" 

She  raised  her  head  again  and  caught  his  hand. 
"  I  wish  I  knew  it  and  were  dead.  I  wish  I  were  in 
my  grave  and  knew  it,  that  would  be  good — oh,  so 
peaceful  and  good!" 

"  It  is  bitter  for  us  both,  Fennimore,  that  the  first 
thing  our  love  brings  us  should  be  only  misery  and 
tears.  Don't  you  think  so?" 

"You  must  not  be  hard  on  me,  Niels.  I  can't 
help  it.  You  can't  see  it  as  I  do — I  am  the  one 
that  should  be  strong,  because  I  am  the  one  that  is 
bound.  I  wish  I  could  take  my  love  and  force  it  back 
into  the  most  secret  depth  of  my  soul  and  lock 


CHAPTER  XI  227 

it  in  and  be  deaf  to  all  its  wailing  and  its  prayers, 
and  then  tell  you  to  go  far,  far  away;  but  I  can't,  1 
have  suffered  so  much,  I  can't  suffer  that  too  — 
I  can't,  Niels.  I  can't  live  without  you — see,  can 
I?  Do  you  think  I  can?" 

She  rose  and  flung  herself  on  his  breast. 

"Here  I  am,  and  I  won't  let  you  go;  I  won't 
send  you  away,  while  I  sit  here  alone  in  the  old 
darkness.  It  is  like  a  bottomless  pit  of  loathing  and 
misery.  I  won't  throw  myself  into  it.  I  would 
rather  jump  into  the  fjord,  Niels.  Even  if  the  new 
life  brings  other  agonies,  at  least  they  are  new  ago- 
nies,and  have  n't  the  dull  sting  of  the  old,  and  can't 
stab  home  like  the  old,  which  know  my  heart  so 
cruelly  well.  Am  I  talking  wildly?  Yes,  of  course  I 
am,  but  it  is  so  good  to  talk  to  you  without  any 
reserve  and  without  having  to  be  careful  not  to 
say  what  I  have  no  right  to.  For  now  you  have  the 
first  right  of  all!  I  wish  you  could  take  me  wholly, 
so  that  I  could  belong  to  you  utterly  and  not  to 
any  one  else  at  all.  I  wish  you  could  lift  me  out  of 
all  relations  that  hedge  me  in ! " 

"  We  must  break  through  them,  Fennimore.  I 
will  arrange  everything  as  well  as  possible.  Don't 
be  afraid !  Some  day,  before  any  one  suspects  any- 
thing, we  shall  be  far  away." 

"No,  no,  we  mustn't  run  away,  anything  but 
that,  anything  else  rather  than  have  my  parents  hear 
their  daughter  had   run  away.  It  is  impossible!  I 


228  NIELS  LYHNE 

will  never  do  it.  By  God  in  heaven,  Niels,  I  will 
never  do  it." 

"Oh,  but  you  must,  girlie,  you  must.  Can't  you 
see  all  the  baseness  and  ugliness  that  will  rise  and 
close  in  around  us  everywhere,  if  we  stay,  all  the  lies 
and  deceptions  that  will  entangle  us  and  drag  us 
down?  I  won't  have  you  smooched  by  all  that.  I  re- 
fuse to  let  it  eat  into  our  love  like  corroding  rust." 

But  she  was  immovable. 

"You  don't  know  what  you  are  condemning  us 
to,"  he  said  sadly.  "It  would  be  far  better  to  crush 
under  iron  heels  now  instead  of  sparing.  Believe  me, 
Fennimore,  we  must  let  our  love  be  everything  to 
us,  the  first  and  only  thing  in  the  world,  that  which 
must  be  saved,  even  at  the  cost  of  stabbing  where 
we  would  rather  heal  and  bringing  sorrow  where  we 
would  rather  keep  every  shadow  of  sorrow  far  away. 
If  we  don't  do  that,  you  will  see  that  the  yoke  we 
bend  our  necks  under  now  will  weigh  on  us  and  at 
last  force  us  to  our  knees,  unmercifully,  inexorably. 
—  A  fight  on  our  knees,  you  don't  know  how  hard 
that  is!  Shall  we  fight  the  fight  anyway,  girlie,  side 
by  side,  against  everything?" 

For  the  first  few  days  Niels  persisted  in  his  at- 
tempts to  persuade  her  to  flight.  Then  he  began  to 
picture  to  himself  what  a  blow  it  would  be  to  Erik 
if  he  were  to  come  home  one  day  and  find  friend 
and  wife  gone  away  together,  and  by  degrees  the 


CHAPTER  XI  229 

whole  thing  took  on  an  unnaturally  tragic  air  of  the 
impossible.  He  accustomed  himself  not  to  think  of 
it,  as  he  did  with  many  other  things  that  he  might 
have  wished  different,  and  threw  himself  with  his 
whole  soul  into  the  situation  as  it  was,  without  any 
conscious  attempts  to  make  it  over  by  dreams  or 
cover  its  defects  with  imaginary  festoons  and  gar- 
lands. But,  oh,  how  sweet  it  was  to  love  for  once 
with  the  love  of  real  life;  for  now  he  knew  that 
nothing  of  what  he  had  imagined  to  be  love  was  real 
love,  neither  the  turgid  longing  of  the  lonely  youth, 
nor  the  passionate  yearning  of  the  dreamer,  nor  yet 
the  nervous  foreboding  of  the  child.  These  were 
currents  in  the  ocean  of  love,  single  reflections  of  its 
full  light,  fragments  of  love  as  the  meteors  rushing 
through  space  are  splinters  of  a  world — for  that\ 
was  love:  a  world  complete  in  itself,  fully  rounded,  \ 
vast,  and  orderly.  It  was  no  medley  of  confused 
sensations  and  moods  rushing  one  upon  another! 
Love  was  like  nature,  ever  changing,  ever  renew- 
ing; no  feeling  died  and  no  emotion  withered  with- 
out giving  life  to  the  seed  of  something  still  more 
perfect  which  was  imbedded  in  it.  Quietly,  sanely, 
with  full,  deep  breaths — it  was  good  to  love  so  and 
love  with  all  his  soul.  The  days  fell,  bright  and  new- 
coined,  down  from  heaven  itself;  they  no  longer 
followed  one  upon  another  as  a  matter  of  course 
like  the  hackneyed  pictures  in  a  peep-show.  Every 
one  was  a  revelation.  With  each  day  that  passed. 


230  NIELS  LYHNE 

he  felt  stronger,  greater,  and  nobler.  He  had  never 
known  such  strength  and  fullness  of  feeling;  there 
were  moments  when  he  seemed  to  himself  titanic, 
much  more  than  man,  so  inexhaustible  was  the  well- 
spring  of  his  soul,  so  broad-winged  the  tenderness 
that  swelled  his  heart,  so  wondrous  the  sweep  of  his 
vision,  so  infinite  the  gentleness  of  his  judgments. 

This  was  the  beginning  of  happiness,  and  they 
were  happy  long. 

The  daily  falsehood  and  deception  and  the  at- 
mosphere of  dishonor  in  which  they  lived  had  not 
yet  gained  power  over  them,  and  could  not  touch 
them  on  those  ecstatic  heights  to  which  Niels  had 
lifted  their  relationship  and,  with  it,  themselves. 
For  he  was  not  simply  a  man  who  seduced  his 
friend's  wife  —  or  rather,  so  he  told  himself  defi- 
antly, he  was  that  man,  but  he  was  also  the  one  who 
saved  an  innocent  woman  whom  life  had  wounded, 
stoned,  and  defiled,  a  woman  who  had  lain  down  to 
let  her  soul  die.  This  woman  he  had  given  back  her 
confidence  in  life,  her  faith  in  the  powers  of  good; 
he  had  lifted  her  spirit  to  noble  heights,  had  given 
her  happiness.  What,  then,  was  best,  the  old  blame- 
less misery  or  that  which  he  had  won  for  her?  He 
did  not  ask,  he  had  made  his  choice. 

He  did  not  quite  mean  this,  if  the  truth  were 
told.  Man  often  builds  for  himself  theories  in  which 
he  refuses  to  dwell.  Thoughts  often  run  faster  than 
the  sense  of  right  and  wrong  is  willing  to  follow. 


CHAPTER  XI  231 

Yet  the  conception  was  really  present  in  his  mind, 
and  it  took  away  some  of  the  cankerous  venom  in- 
herent in  the  craftiness,  falseness,  and  duplicity  of 
their  lives. 

Yet  the  evil  effects  were  soon  noticeable.  The 
poison  was  working  on  so  many  fine  nerve  filaments 
that  it  could  not  but  do  harm  and  cause  suffering, 
and  the  time  was  hastened  when  Erik,  shortly  after 
New  Year,  announced  that  he  had  caught  an  idea 
—  something  with  a  green  tunic  and  a  threatening 
attitude,  he  told  Niels.  Did  he  remember  the  green 
in  Salvator  Rosa's  Jonah?  Something  on  that  order. 

Although  Erik's  work  consisted  chiefly  in  lying 
on  the  couch  in  his  studio,  smoking  shag  and  read- 
ing Marryat,  it  had  at  least  the  effect  of  keeping 
him  at  home  for  the  time  being,  thereby  forcing 
them  to  use  more  caution  and  necessitating  new  lies 
and  artifices. 

Fennimore's  ingenuity  in  this  direction  was  what 
brought  the  first  cloud  to  their  heaven.  It  was 
scarcely  perceptible  at  first,  only  a  doubt,  light  as 
thistle-down,  flitting  through  Niels's  mind  as  to 
whether  his  love  were  not  nobler  than  the  one  he 
loved.  It  had  not  yet  taken  shape  as  a  thought,  it 
was  only  a  dim  foreboding  which  pointed  in  that 
direction,  a  vague  giving  way  in  his  mind,  a  leaning 
to  that  side. 

Yet  it  came  again  and  brought  others  in  its  wake, 
thoughts  at  first  vague  and  indistinct,  then  clearer 


232  NIELS  LYHNE 

and  sharper  for  each  time  they  appeared.  It  was 
astonishing  with  what  furious  haste  these  thoughts 
could  undermine,  debase,  and  take  away  the 
glamor.  Their  love  was  not  lessened.  On  the  con- 
trary, it  glowed  more  passionately  while  it  sank,  but 
these  handclasps  stolen  under  table-covers,  these 
kisses  snatched  in  passages  and  behind  doors,  these 
long  looks  right  under  the  eyes  of  him  they  de- 
ceivedy  took  away  all  the  lofty  tenor.  Happiness  no 
longer  stood  still  above  their  heads;  they  had  to 
filch  her  smiles  and  her  light  as  best  they  could,  and 
after  a  while  their  wiles  and  cunning  were  no  longer 
necessary  evils,  but  amusing  triumphs.  Deception 
became  their  natural  element  and  made  them  con- 
temptible and  petty.  There  were  degrading  secrets, 
too,  over  which  they  had  hitherto  grieved  sepa- 
rately, assuming  ignorance  in  each  other's  eyes, 
but  which  they  now  had  to  share;  for  Erik  was  not 
bashful,  and  would  often  caress  his  wife  in  Niels's 
presence,  kiss  her,  take  her  on  his  lap,  and  embrace 
her,  while  Fennimore  had  neither  courage  nor  dig- 
nity sufficient  to  repel  these  caresses;  the  conscious- 
ness of  her  guilt  made  her  uncertain  and  afraid. 

So  it  sank  and  went  on  sinking,  that  lofty  castle 
of  their  love,  from  the  pinnacles  of  which  they  had 
gazed  so  proudly  out  over  the  world,  and  within 
which  they  had  felt  so  strong  and  noble. 

Still  they  were  happy  among  the  ruins. 

When  they  walked  in  the  woods  now,  it  was 


CHAPTER  XI  233 

usually  on  gloomy  days,  when  the  fog  hung  under 
the  dark  branches  and  thickened  between  the  wet 
trunks,  so  that  none  should  see  how  they  kissed  and 
embraced,  both  here  and  there,  and  none  should 
hear  how  their  frivolous  talk  rang  with  peals  of 
wanton  laughter. 

The  melancholy  of  eternity,  which  had  exalted 
their  love,  was  gone;  now  there  was  nothing  but 
smiles  and  jests  between  them.  With  feverish  haste 
they  snatched  greedily  at  the  fleeting  seconds  of 
joy,  as  though  they  must  hurry  in  their  love  and 
had  not  a  lifetime  before  them. 

It  brought  no  change  when  Erik,  after  a  while, 
grew  tired  of  his  idea  and  again  began  his  carousing 
so  eagerly  that  he  was  rarely  at  home  for  forty-eight 
hours  at  a  stretch.  Where  they  had  fallen,  there 
they  lay.  Once  in  a  great  while,  perhaps,  in  lonely 
hours,  they  gazed  regretfully  toward  the  heights 
from  which  they  had  fallen,  or  perhaps  they  only 
wondered,  and  thought  what  a  strain  it  must  have 
been  to  stay  on  that  level,  and  felt  themselves  more 
snugly  housed  where  they  were.  There  was  no 
change.  At  least  there  was  no  return  to  the  former 
days,  but  the  flabby  uncleanness  of  living  as  they 
did  and  not  running  away  together  became  more 
present  in  their  consciousness  and  linked  them 
together  in  a  closer  and  baser  union  through  the 
common  sense  of  guilt;  for  neither  of  them  wished 
any  change  in  things  as  they  were.  Nor  did  they 


234  NIELS  LYHNE 

pretend  to  each  other  that  they  did,  for  there  had 
developed  a  cynical  intimacy  between  them  such  as 
often  exists  between  fellow  criminals,  and  there  was 
nothing  in  their  relations  that  they  shrank  from 
putting  into  words.  With  sinister  frankness,  they 
called  things  by  their  right  names  and,  as  they  put 
it  to  themselves,  faced  the  facts  as  they  were. 

In  February  it  had  seemed  that  the  winter  was 
over,  but  then  Mother  March  had  come  shaking 
her  white  mantle  with  its  loose  lining,  and  snow- 
storm after  snowstorm  covered  the  ground  with 
thick  layers.  Then  followed  calm  weather  and  hard 
frost,  and  the  fjord  settled  under  a  crust  of  ice  six 
inches  thick,  which  lay  there  a  long  time. 

One  evening  toward  the  end  of  the  month,  Fen- 
nimore  was  sitting  alone  in  her  parlor  after  tea  and 
waiting. 

The  room  was  brightly  illumined;  the  piano 
stood  open  with  candles  lit,  and  the  silk  shade  had 
been  taken  from  the  lamp.  The  gilded  moldings 
caught  the  light,  and  the  pictures  on  the  walls 
seemed  to  stand  out  with  a  kind  of  vigilance.  The 
hyacinths  had  been  moved  from  the  windows  to  the 
writing-table,  where  they  made  a  mass  of  delicate 
colors,  filling  the  air  with  a  penetrating  fragrance 
that  seemed  cool  in  its  purity.  The  fire  in  the  stove 
burned  with  a  pleasant  subdued  crackle. 

Fennimore  was  walking  up  and  down  the  room 


CHAPTER  XI  235 

almost  as  if  she  were  balancing  on  a  dark  red  stripe 
in  the  carpet.  She  wore  a  somewhat  old-fashioned 
black  silk  dress  with  a  heavily  embroidered  edge 
that  weighed  it  down  and  trailed,  first  on  one  side, 
then  on  the  other,  with  every  step  she  took. 

She  was  humming  to  herself  and  holding  with 
both  hands  a  string  of  large  pale  yellow  amber 
beads  that  hung  from  her  neck.  Whenever  she  wa- 
vered on  the  red  stripe,  she  would  stop  humming, 
but  still  grasped  the  necklace.  Perhaps  she  was 
making  an  omen  for  herself:  if  she  could  walk  a  cer- 
tain number  of  times  up  and  down  without  getting 
off  the  red  stripe  and  without  letting  go  with  her 
hands,  Niels  would  come. 

He  had  been  there  in  the  morning,  w^hen  Erik 
went  away,  and  had  stayed  till  late  in  the  afternoon, 
but  he  had  promised  to  come  again  as  soon  as  the 
moon  was  up  and  it  was  light  enough  to  see  the 
holes  in  the  ice  on  the  fjord. 

Fennimore  had  obtained  her  omen,  whatever  it 
was,  and  stepped  over  to  the  window. 

It  looked  as  if  there  would  not  be  any  moon 
to-night;  the  sky  was  very  black,  and  the  darkness 
must  be  more  intense  out  there  on  the  gray-blue 
fjord  than  on  land  where  the  snow  lay.  Perhaps  it 
was  best  that  he  did  not  attempt  it.  She  sat  down 
at  the  piano  with  a  sigh  of  resignation,  then  got  up 
again  to  look  at  the  clock.  She  came  back  and  reso- 
lutely propped  up  a  big  book  of  music  before  her. 


236  NIELS  LYHNE 

but  did  not  play,  merely  turning  the  leaves  absent- 
mindedly,  lost  in  her  own  thoughts. 

Suppose,  after  all,  that  he  was  standing  on  the 
opposite  shore  this  very  moment,  fastening  on  his 
skates.  He  could  be  here  in  an  instant !  She  saw  him 
plainly,  a  little  bit  out  of  breath  after  skating,  and 
blinking  with  his  eyes  against  the  light  on  coming 
from  the  darkness  outside.  He  would  bring  a  breath 
of  cold  air,  and  his  beard  would  be  full  of  tiny  little 
bright  drops.  Then  he  would  say  —  what  would  he 
say? 

She  smiled  and  glanced  down  at  herself. 

And  still  the  moon  did  not  appear. 

She  went  over  to  the  window  again  and  stood 
gazing  out,  till  the  darkness  seemed  to  be  filled 
before  her  eyes  with  tiny  white  sparks  and  rainbow- 
colored  rings.  But  they  were  only  a  vague  glimmer. 
She  wished  they  would  be  transformed  into  fire- 
works out  there,  rockets  shooting  up  in  long,  long 
curves  and  then  turning  to  tiny  snakes  that  bored 
their  way  into  the  sky  and  died  in  a  flicker;  or  into 
a  great,  huge  pale  ball  that  hung  tremulous  in  the 
sky  and  slowly  sank  down  in  a  rain  of  myriad- 
colored  stars.  Look!  Look!  Soft  and  rounded  like 
a  curtsy,  like  a  golden  rain  that  curtsied. —  Fare- 
well!  Farewell!  There  went  the  last  one. —  Oh 
dear,  if  he  would  only  come !  She  did  not  want  to 
play — and  at  that  she  turned  to  the  piano,  struck 
an  octave  harshly,  and  held  the  keys  down  till  the 


CHAPTER  XI  237 

tones  had  quite  died  away,  then  did  the  same  again, 
and  again,  and  yet  again.  She  did  not  want  to  play, 
did  not  want  to.  —  She  would  rather  dance!  For  a 
moment  she  closed  her  eyes,  and  in  imagination 
she  felt  herself  whirling  through  a  vast  hall  of  red 
and  white  and  gold.  How  delicious  it  would  be  to 
have  danced  and  to  be  hot  and  tired  and  drink 
champagne!  Suddenly  she  remembered  how  she 
and  a  school  friend  had  concocted  champagne  from 
soda  water  and  eau  de  cologne,  and  how  sick  it  had 
made  them  when  they  drank  it. 

She  straightened  herself  and  walked  across  the 
room,  instinctively  smoothing  her  dress  as  after 
a  dance. 

"  And  now  let  us  be  sensible ! "  she  said,  took  her 
embroidery  and  settled  herself  in  a  large  armchair 
near  the  lamp. 

Yet  she  did  not  work;  her  hands  sank  down  into 
her  lap,  and  soon  she  snuggled  down  into  the  chair 
with  little  lazy  movements,  fitting  herself  into  its 
curves,  her  face  resting  on  her  hand,  her  dress 
wrapped  around  her  feet. 

She  wondered  curiously  whether  other  wives 
were  like  her,  whether  they  had  made  a  mistake 
and  been  unhappy  and  then  had  loved  some  one 
else.  She  passed  in  review  the  ladies  at  home  in 
Fjordby,  one  by  one.  Then  she  thought  of  Mrs. 
Boye.  Niels  had  told  her  about  Mrs.  Boye,  and 
she  had  always  been  a  tantalizing  riddle  to  her 


238  NIELS  LYHNE 

—  this  woman  whom  she  hated  and  felt  humili- 
ated by. 

Erik,  too,  had  once  told  her  that  he  had  been 
madly  in  love  with  Mrs.  Boye. 

Ah,  if  one  could  know  everything  about  her! 

She  laughed  at  the  thought  of  Mrs.  Boye's  new 
husband. 

All  the  time,  while  her  thoughts  were  thus  en- 
gaged, she  was  longing  and  listening  for  Niels,  and 
in^agined  him  coming,  always  coming  out  there  on 
the  ice.  She  little  guessed  that  for  the  last  two  hours 
a  tiny  black  dot  had  been  working  its  way  over  the 
snowy  meadows  with  a  message  for  her  very  dif- 
ferent from  the  one  she  was  expecting  from  across 
the  fjord.  It  was  only  a  man  in  homespun  and 
greased  boots,  and  now  he  tapped  on  the  kitchen 
window,  frightening  the  maid. 

It  was  a  letter,  Trine  said  when  she  came  in  to 
her  mistress.  Fennimore  took  it.  It  was  a  telegram. 
Quietly  she  gave  the  maid  the  receipt  and  dis- 
missed her;  she  was  not  in  the  least  alarmed,  for 
Erik  of  late  had  often  telegraphed  that  he  would 
bring  one  or  two  guests  home  with  him  the  follow- 
ing day. 

Then  she  read. 

Suddenly  she  turned  white  and  darted  wildly 
from  her  seat  out  into  the  middle  of  the  room, 
staring  at  the  door  with  expectant  terror. 

She  would  not  let  it  come  into  the  house,  did 


CHAPTER  XI  239 

not  dare  to,  and  with  one  bound  she  threw  herself 
against  the  door,  pressing  her  shoulder  against  it, 
and  turned  the  key  till  it  cut  her  hand.  But  it  would 
not  turn,  no  matter  how  hard  she  tried.  Her  hand 
dropped.  Then  she  remembered  that  the  thing  was 
not  here  at  all — it  was  far  away  from  her  in  a 
strange  house. 

She  began  to  shake,  her  knees  would  no  longer 
support  her,  and  she  slid  along  the  door  to  the 
floor. 

Erik  was  dead.  The  horses  had  run  away,  had 
overturned  the  carriage  at  a  street  corner,  and  hurled 
Erik  with  his  head  against  the  wall.  His  skull  had 
been  fractured,  and  now  he  lay  dead  at  Aalborg. 
That  was  the  way  it  had  happened,  and  most  of  this 
story  was  told  in  the  telegram.  No  one  had  been 
with  him  in  the  carriage  except  the  white-necked 
tutor  known  as  the  Arab.  It  was  he  who  had  tele- 
graphed. 

She  crouched  on  the  floor  moaning  feebly,  both 
palms  spread  out  on  the  carpet,  her  eyes  staring 
with  a  fixed,  empty  look,  as  she  swayed  helplessly 
to  and  fro. 

Only  a  moment  ago  everything  had  been  light 
and  fragrance  around  her,  and,  however  much  she 
tried,  she  could  not  instantly  put  all  this  out  of  her 
consciousness  to  admit  the -inky  black  night  of  grief 
and  remorse.  It  was  not  her  fault  that  her  mind  was 
still  haunted  by  fitful,  dazzHng  gleams  of  love's 


240  NIELS  LYHNE 

happiness  and  love's  pleasure;  that  intense,  fool- 
ish desires  would  force  their  way  out  of  the  whirl, 
seeking  the  bliss  of  forgetfulness,  or  trying  to  stop 
with  a  frenzied  wrench  the  revolving  wheel  of  for- 
tune. 

But  it  soon  passed. 

In  black  swarms, from  everywhere, dark  thoughts 
came  flying  like  ravens,  lured  by  the  corpse  of  her 
happiness,  and  hacked  it  beak  by  beak,  even  while 
the  warmth  of  life  still  lingered  in  it.  They  tore  and 
slashed  and  made  it  hideous  and  unrecognizable, 
until  the  whole  thing  was  nothing  but  a  carrion  of 
loathing  and  horror. 

She  rose  and  walked  about,  supporting  herself  by 
chairs  and  tables  like  one  who  is  ill.  Desperately 
she  looked  around  for  some  cobweb  of  help,  if  it 
were  only  a  comforting  glance,  a  svmpathetic  pat  of 
the  hand,  but  her  eyes  met  nothing  but  the  glaring 
family  portraits,  all  the  strangers  who  had  been  wit- 
nesses of  her  fall  and  her  crime  —  sleepv  old  gentle- 
men, prim-mouthed  matrons,  and  their  ever-present 
gnome  child,  the  girl  with  the  great  round  eyes  and 
bulging  forehead.  It  had  acquired  memories  enough 
at  last,  this  strange  furniture,  the  table  over  there, 
and  that  chair,  the  footstool  with  the  black  poodle- 
dog,  and  the  portiere  like  a  dressing-gown,  —  she 
had  saturated  them  all  with  memories,  adulterous 
memories,  which  they  now  spewed  out  and  flung 
after  her.  Oh,  it  was  terrible  to  be  locked  in  with  all 


CHAPTER  XI  241 

these  spectres  of  crime  and  with  herself.  She  shud- 
dered at  herself;  she  pointed  accusing  fingers  at 
herself,  at  this  dishonored  Fennimore  who  crouched 
at  her  feet;  she  pulled  her  dress  away  from  between 
her  imploring  hands.  Mercy?  No,  there  was-  no 
mercy !  How  could  there  be  mercy  before  those  dead 
eyes  in  the  strange  town,  those  eyes  which  had  be- 
come seeing,  now  that  they  were  glazed  in  death, 
and  saw  how  she  had  thrown  his  honor  in  the  mud, 
lied  at  his  lips,  been  faithless  at  his  heart. 

She  could  feel  those  dead  eyes  riveted  on  her; 
she  did  not  know  whence  they  came,  but  they  fol- 
lowed her,  gliding  down  her  body  like  two  ice-cold 
rays.  As  she  looked  down,  while  every  thread  of  the 
carpet,  every  stitch  in  the  footstools,  seemed  un- 
naturally clear  in  the  strong,  sharp  light,  she  felt 
something  walking  about  her  with  the  footsteps  of 
dead  men,  felt  it  brushing  against  her  dress  so  dis- 
tinctly that  she  screamed  with  terror,  and  darted 
to  one  side.  But  it  came  in  front  of  her  like  hands 
and  yet  not  like  hands,  something  that  clutched  at 
her  slowly,  clutched  derisively  and  triumphantly 
at  her  heart,  that  marvel  of  treachery,  that  yellow 
pearl  of  deceit!  And  she  retreated  till  she  backed 
up  against  the  table,  but  it  was  still  there,  and  her 
bosom  gave  no  protection  against  it;  it  clutched 
through  her  skin  and  flesh  .  .  .  She  almost  died  of 
terror,  as  she  stood  there,  helplessly  bending  back 
over  the  table,  while  every  nerve  contracted  with 


242  NIELS  LYHNE 

fear,  and  her  eyes  stared  as  if  they  were  being  mur- 
dered in  their  sockets. 

Then  that  passed. 

She  looked  around  with  a  haunted  look,  then 
sank  down  on  her  knees  and  prayed  a  long  time. 
She  repented  and  confessed,  wildly  and  unrestrain- 
edly, in  growing  passion,  with  the  same  fanatic  self- 
loathing  that  drives  the  nun  to  scourge  her  naked 
body.  She  sought  fervently  after  the  most  grovel- 
ling expressions,  intoxicating  herself  with  self- 
abasement  and  with  a  humility  that  thirsted  for 
degradation. 

At  last  she  rose.  Her  bosom  heaved  violently,  and 
there  was  a  faint  light  in  the  pale  cheeks,  which 
seemed  to  have  grown  fuller  during  her  prayer. 

She  looked  around  the  room  as  if  she  were  tak- 
ing a  silent  vow.  Then  she  went  into  the  adjoining 
room,  closed  the  door  after  her,  stood  still  a  moment 
as  though  to  accustom  herself  to  the  darkness, 
groped  her  way  to  the  door  which  opened  on  the 
glass-enclosed  veranda,  and  went  out. 

It  was  lighter  there.  The  moon  had  risen,  and 
shone  through  the  close-packed  frozen  crystals  on 
the  glass;  the  light  came  yellowish  through  the 
panes,  blue  and  red  through  the  squares  of  colored 
glass  that  framed  them. 

She  melted  a  hole  in  the  ice  with  her  hand  and 
carefully  wiped  away  the  moisture  with  her  hand- 
kerchief. 


CHAPTER  XI  243 

As  yet  there  was  no  one  in  sight  out  on  the  fjord. 

She  began  to  walk  up  and  down  in  her  glass  cage. 
There  was  no  furniture  out  there  except  a  settee 
of  cane  and  bent  wood,  covered  with  withered  ivy 
leaves  from  the  vines  overhead.  Every  time  she 
passed  it,  the  leaves  rustled  faintly  with  the  stirring 
of  the  air,  and  now  and  then  her  dress  caught  a  leaf 
on  the  floor,  drawing  it  along  with  a  scratching 
sound  over  the  boards. 

Back  and  forth  she  walked  on  her  dreary  watch, 
her  arms  folded  over  her  breast,  hardening  herself 
against  the  cold. 

He  came. 

She  opened  the  door  with  a  quick  wrench,  and 
stepped  out  into  the  frozen  snow  in  her  thin  shoes. 
She  had  no  pity  on  herself,  she  could  have  gone 
bare-footed  to  that  meeting. 

Niels  had  slowed  up  at  the  sight  of  the  black 
figure  against  the  snow  and  was  skating  toward  land 
with  hesitating,  tentative  strokes. 

That  stealthy  figure  seemed  to  burn  into  her  eyes. 
Every  familiar  movement  and  feature  struck  her  as 
a  shameless  insult,  as  a  boast  of  degrading  secrets. 
She  shook  with  hatred;  her  heart  swelled  with 
curses,  and  she  could  scarcely  control  her  anger. 

"It  is  I!"  she  cried  out  to  him  jeeringly,  "the 
harlot,  Fennimore ! " 

"But  for  God's  sake,  sweetheart.^"  he  asked, 
astonished,  as  he  came  within  a  few  feet  of  her. 


244  NIELS  LYHNE 

"  Erik  is  dead." 

"Dead!  When?"  He  had  to  step  out  into  the 
snow  with  his  skates  to  keep  from  falling.  "  Oh,  but 
tell  me!"  Eagerly  he  took  a  step  nearer. 

They  were  now  standing  close  together,  and  she 
had  to  restrain  herself  from  striking  that  pale,  dis- 
torted face  with  her  clenched  fist. 

"I  will  tell  you,  never  fear,"  she  cried.  "He  is 
dead,  as  I  said.  He  had  a  runaway  in  Aalborg  and 
got  his  head  crushed,  while  we  were  deceiving  him 
here." 

"It  is  terrible!"  Niels  moaned,  pressing  his 
hands  to  his  temples.  "Who  could  have  dreamed — 
Oh,  I  wish  we  had  been  faithful  to  him,  Fennimore ! 
Erik,  poor  Erik!  —  I  wish  I  were  in  his  place!"  He 
sobbed  aloud,  writhing  with  pain. 

"I  hate  you,  Niels  Lyhne!" 

"Oh,  what  does  it  matter  about  us?"  Niels 
groaned;  "if  we  could  only  get  him  back!  Poor 
Fennimore!"  he  said  with  a  change  of  feeling. 
"  Never  mind  me.  You  hate  me,  you  say?  You  may 
well  hate  me."  He  rose  suddenly.  "  Let  us  go  in," 
he  said.  "  I  don't  know  what  I  am  saying.  Who  was 
it  that  telegraphed,  did  you  say  ? " 

"In !"  Fennimore  screamed,  infuriated  by  his 
failure  to  notice  her  hostility.  "In  there!  Never 
shall  you  set  your  craven,  despicable  foot  inside 
that  house  again.  How  dare  you  think  of  it,  you 
wretch,  you  false  dog,  who  came  sneaking  in  here 


CHAPTER  XI  245 

and  stole  your  friend's  honor,  because  it  was  too 
poorly  hidden  !  What,  did  you  not  steal  it  under  his 
very  eyes,  because  he  thought  you  were  honest,  you 
house-thief! " 

"Hush,  hush,  are  you  mad?  What  is  the  matter 
with  you  !  What  sort  of  language  are  you  using  ? " 
He  had  caught  her  arm  firmly,  drawing  her  to  him, 
and  looked  straight  into  her  face  in  amazement. 
"You  must  try  to  come  to  your  senses,  child,"  he 
said  in  a  gentler  tone.  "You  can't  mend  matters  by 
slinging  ugly  words." 

She  wrenched- her  arm  away  with  such  force  that 
he  staggered  and  almost  lost  his  uncertain  foothold. 

"  Can't  you  hear  that  I  hate  you  ! "  she  screamed 
shrilly.  "And  is  n't  there  so  much  of  a  decent  man's 
brain  left  in  you  that  you  can  understand  it!  How 
blind  I  must  have  been  when  I  loved  you,  you 
patched  together  with  lies,  when  I  had  him  at  my 
side,  who  was  ten  thousand  times  better  than  you. 
I  shall  hate  and  despise  you  to  the  end  of  my  Hfe. 
Before  you  came,  I  was  honest,  I  had  never  done 
anything  wicked;  but  then  you  came  with  your 
poetry  and  your  rubbish  and  dragged  me  down  with 
your  lies,  into  the  mud  with  you.  What  have  I  done 
to  you  that  you  could  not  leave  me  alone — I  who 
should  have  been  sacred  to  you  above  all  others! 
Now  I  have  to  live  day  after  day  with  this  shameful 
blot  on  my  soul,  and  I  shall  never  meet  any  one 
so  base  but  that  I  know  myself  to  be  baser.  All  the 


246  NIELS  LYHNE 

memories  of  my  girlhood  you  have  poisoned.  What 
have  I  to  look  back  on  that  is  clean  and  good  now ! 
You  have  tainted  everything.  It  is  not  only  he  that 
is  dead,  everything  bright  and  good  that  has  been 
between  us  is  dead,  too,  and  rotten.  Oh,  God  help 
me,  is  it  fair  that  I  can't  get  any  revenge  on  you  after 
all  you  have  done?  Make  me  honest  again,  Niels 
Lyhne,  make  me  pure  and  good  again!  No,  no — 
but  it  ought  to  be  possible  to  torture  you  into  un- 
doing the  wrong  you  have  done.  Can  you  undo  it 
with  lies?  Don't  stand  there  and  crouch  under  your 
own  helplessness.  I  want  to  see  you  suffer,  here 
before  my  eyes,  and  writhe  in  pain  and  despair  and 
be  miserable.  Let  him  be  miserable,  God,  do  not- 
let  him  steal  my  revenge  too!  Go,  you  wretch, go! 
I  cast  you  off,  but  be  sure  that  I  drag  you  with  me 
through  all  the  agonies  my  hate  can  call  down  over 
you. 

She  had  stretched  out  her  arms  menacingly.  Now 
she  turned  and  went  in, and  the  veranda  door  rattled 
softly,  as  she  closed  it, 

Niels  stood  looking  after  her  in  amazement, 
almost  with  disbelief.  That  pale,  vengeful  face 
seemed  to  be  still  there  before  him,  so  strangely 
base-souled  and  coarse,  all  its  delicate  beauty  of 
contour  gone,  as  if  a  rough,  barbarous  hand  had 
ploughed  up  all  its  lines. 

He  stumbled  cautiously  down  to  the  ice  and 
began  to  skate  slowly  toward  the  mouth  of  the 


CHAPTER  XI  247 

fjord,  with  the  moonlight  in  front  of  him  and  the 
wind  in  his  back.  Gradually  he  increased  his  speed, 
as  his  thoughts  took  his  attention  from  the  sur- 
roundings, till  the  ice  splinters  flew  from  the  run- 
ners of  his  skates  and  rattled  on  the  smooth  surface, 
blown  along  with  him  by  the  rising  frost  wind. 

So  that  was  the  end !  So  that  was  the  way  he  had 
saved  this  woman  soul  and  lifted  it  and  given  it 
happiness !  It  was  certainly  beautiful,  his  relation  to 
the  dead  friend,  his  childhood  friend,  for  whom  he 
would  have  sacrificed  his  future,  his  life,  his  all !  He 
with  his  sacrificing  and  his  saving!  Let  heaven  and 
earth  behold  in  him  a  man  who  preserved  his  life 
on  the  heights  of  honor  without  spot  or  blemish  in 
order  not  to  cast  a  shadow  over  the  Idea  he  served 
and  was  called  to  promulgate. 

No  doubt  that  was  another  of  his  boastful  fancies 
that  his  paltry  little  life  could  put  spots  on  the  sun 
of  the  Idea.  Good  God,  he  was  always  taking  these 
high  and  mighty  views  of  himself,  it  was  bred  in  his 
bone.  If  he  could  not  be  anything  better,  he  must 
at  least  be  a  Judas  and  call  himself  Iscariot  in 
grandiose  gloom.  That  sounded  like  something. 
Was  he  forever  going  to  put  on  airs  as  if  he  were 
a  responsible  minister  to  the  Idea,  a  member  of  its 
privy  council,  getting  everything  concerning  hu- 
manity at  first  hand !  Would  he  never  learn  to  do 
his  duty  in  barrack  service  for  the  Idea  with  all 
simplicity  as  a  private  of  a  very  subordinate  class? 


248  NIELS  LYHNE 

There  were  red  fires  out  on  the  ice,  and  he  skated 
so  near  them  that  a  gigantic  shadow  shot  out  for  a 
moment  from  his  feet,  turned  forward,  and  disap- 
peared again. 

He  thought  of  Erik  and  of  what  kind  of  a  friend 
he  had  been  to  Erik.  He !  His  childhood  memories 
wrung  their  hands  over  him;  his  youthful  dreams 
covered  their  heads  and  wept  over  him;  his  whole 
past  stared  after  him  with  a  long  look  full  of  re- 
proach. He  had  betrayed  it  all  for  a  love  as  small 
and  mean  as  himself  There  had  been  exaltation 
in  this  love,  but  he  had  betrayed  that  too. 

Whither  could  he  flee  to  escape  these  attempts 
that  always  ended  in  the  ditch  ?  All  his  life  had  been 
nothing  else,  and  it  would  never  be  anything  else 
in  the  future;  he  knew  that  and  felt  it  with  such 
certainty  that  he  sickened  at  the  thought  of  all  this 
futile  endeavor,  and  he  wished  with  all  his  soul 
that  he  could  run  away  and  escape  this  meaningless 
fate.  If  only  the  ice  would  break  under  him  now  as 
he  skated,  and  all  would  be  over  with  a  gasp  and  a 
spasm  in  the  cold  water! 

He  stopped,  exhausted,  and  looked  back.  The 
moon  had  gone  down,  and  the  fjord  stretched  long 
and  dark  between  the  white  hills  on  either  side. 
Then  he  turned  and  worked  his  way  back  against 
the  wind.  It  was  very  strong  now,  and  he  was  tired. 
He  skated  closer  to  the  shore  to  get  the  shelter  of  the 
hills,  but,  as  he  struggled  thus,  he  came  on  a  hole 


CHAPTER  XI  249 

in  the  ice  made  by  the  winds  sweeping  down  from 
the  hills,  and  he  felt  the  thin,  elastic  crust  give  way 
under  him  with  a  crackling  sound. 

Ah,  he  breathed  more  easily,  in  spite  of  all,  when 
he  set  foot  on  the  firm  ice  again!  Under  the  stim- 
ulus of  fear,  his  exhaustion  had  almost  left  him,  and 
he  skated  on  vigorously. 

While  he  was  struggling  out  there,  Fennimore  sat 
in  the  lighted  room,  baffled  and  miserable.  She  felt 
herself  cheated  out  of  her  revenge.  She  hardly  knew 
what  she  had  expected,  but  it  was  something  en- 
tirely different;  she  had  had  a  vision  of  something 
mighty  and  majestic,  something  of  swords  and  red 
flames,  or — not  that,  but  something  that  would 
sweep  her  along  and  lift  her  to  a  throne,  but  instead 
it  had  all  turned  out  so  small  and  paltry,  and  she 
had  felt  more  like  a  common  scold  than  like  one 
who  utters  curses.  .  .  . 

After  all,  she  had  learned  something  from  Niels. 

Early  in  the  morning  of  the  following  day,  while 
Niels,  overcome  with  exhaustion,  was  still  asleep, 
she  left  the  house. 


Chapter  XII 

FOR  the  better  part  of  two  years  Niels  Lyhne 
had  roamed  about  on  the  Continent. 
He  was  very  lonely,  without  kith  or  kin  or  any 
close  friend  of  his  heart.  Yet  there  was  another  and 
greater  loneliness  that  encompassed  him;  for  how- 
ever desolate  and  forsaken  a  man  may  feel  when  he 
has  no  single  spot  on  all  this  vast  earth  to  which  his 
affections  can  cling,  which  he  can  bless  when  the 
heart  w/Y/overflow  and  yearn  for  when  longing  will 
spread  its  wings,  there  is  no  existence  so  lonely  that 
he  is  utterly  alone  if  he  can  only  see  the  fixed  bright 
star  ofa  life  goal  shining  overhead.  But  Niels  Lyhne 
had  no  star.  He  did  not  know  what  to  do  with  him- 
self and  his  gifts.  It  was  all  very  well  to  have  talent 
if  he  could  only  have  used  it,  but  he  went  about  like 
a  painter  without  hands.  How  he  envied  the  people, 
great  and  small,  who  always,  whenever  they  reached 
out  into  life,  found  a  handle  to  lay  hold  of;  for  he 
could  never  find  any  handle.  It  seemed  as  though 
he  could  do  nothing  but  sing  over  again  the  old 
romantic  songs,  and  in  truth  he  had  so  far  done 
nothing  else.  His  talent  was  like  something  apart  in 
him,  a  quiet  Pompeii,  or  a  harp  that  had  to  be  taken 
out  of  its  corner.  It  was  not  all-pervading,  did  not 
run  down  the  street  with  him  or  tingle  in  his  finger- 
tips—  not  in  the  least.  His  talent  had  no  grip  on 
him.  Sometimes  it  seemed  to  him  that  he  had  been 


CHAPTER  XII  251 

born  Haifa  century  too  late,  sometimes  that  he  had 
come  altogether  too  early.  His  talent  was  rooted 
in  something  of  the  past;  it  could  not  draw  nour- 
ishment from  his  opinions,  his  convictions,  and 
his  sympathies,  could  not  absorb  them  and  give 
them  form.  The  two  elements  seemed  always  to 
be  gliding  apart  like  water  and  oil,  which  can  be 
shaken  together,  but  can  never  mix,  never  become 
one. 

Gradually,  as  he  began  to  realize  this,  he  sank 
into  a  boundless  dejection  and  grew  inclined  to  take 
an  ironic,  suspicious  view  of  himself  and  his  whole 
past.  There  must  be  something  wrong  with  him,  he 
told  himself,  something  incurably  wrong  in  the  very 
marrow  of  his  being;  for  surely  a  man  could  fuse 
the  varying  elements  in  his  own  nature — that  he 
firmly  believed. 

This  was  the  state  of  his  mind  when  he  settled 
down,  in  the  month  of  September,  toward  the  end  of 
the  second  year  of  his  exile,  on  the  shores  of  Lake 
Garda,  in  the  little  town  of  Riva. 

Not  long  afterward,  the  region  was  hedged  about 
by  difficulties  that  put  astop  to  travelling  and  kept  all 
strangers  away.  Cholera  had  broken  out  round  about 
Venice  and  down  south  in  Descensano  and  in  the 
north  by  the  Trentino.  Under  these  circumstances, 
Riva  was  not  lively,  for  the  hotels  had  been  emptied 
at  the  first  rumor,  and  tourists  bound  for  Italy  took 
another  route. 


252  NIELS  LYHNE 

Naturally,  the  few  people  who  remained  drew  all 
the  more  closely  together. 

The  most  remarkable  person  among  them  was  a 
famous  opera  singer,  whose  real  name  was  Madame 
Odero.  Her  stage  name  was  far  more  celebrated. 
She  and  her  companion,  Niels,  and  a  deaf  doctor 
from  Vienna  were  the  only  guests  at  the  Golden 
Sun,  the  leading  hotel  in  town. 

Niels  felt  very  much  attracted  to  her,  and  she 
yielded  to  that  warmth  of  manner  in  him  which  is 
often  a  characteristic  of  people  who  are  at  strife  with 
themselves  and  therefore  feel  the  need  of  establish- 
ing their  relations  with  others  on  a  safe  basis. 

Madame  Odero  had  lived  there  for  nearly  seven 
months,  trying  to  recover,  by  complete  rest,  from 
the  after  effects  of  a  throat  trouble  that  had  threat- 
ened her  voice.  Her  physician  had  told  her  to  ab- 
stain for  a  year  from  singing  and,  in  order  to  avoid 
temptation,  from  all  music.  Not  until  the  year  was 
over  would  he  allow  her  to  attempt  to  sing,  and 
then,  if  no  weariness  followed,  she  might  consider 
herself  cured. 

Niels  acquired  a  kind  of  civilizing  influence  over 
Madame  Odero,  who  was  a  fiery,  passionate  nature 
with  no  fine  shades.  It  had  been  a  terrible  sentence 
to  her  when  she  was  condemned  to  live  a  whole 
year  without  applause  and  adoration,  and  at  first 
she  had  been  in  despair,  gazing  horror-stricken  at 
the  twelve  months  stretching  before  her  as  upon  a 


CHAPTER  XII  253 

deep,  black  grave  into  which  she  was  being  thrust; 
but  everybody  seemed  to  think  it  was  unavoidable, 
and  one  fine  morning  she  suddenly  fled  to  Riva. 
It  would  have  been  quite  possible  for  her  to  have 
lived  in  a  livelier  and  more  frequented  place,  but 
that  was  the  very  thing  she  sought  to  avoid.  She 
felt  ashamed,  as  though  she  had  been  marked  with 
an  outward  visible  blemish,  imagining  that  people 
pitied  her  because  of  this  infirmity,  and  that  they 
discussed  her  among  themselves.  Therefore  she  had 
shunned  all  society  in  her  new  abode  and  had  lived 
almost  entirely  in  her  rooms,  where  she  sometimes 
took  revenge  on  the  doors  when  her  voluntary  con- 
finement became  unbearable.  Now  that  everybody 
had  left,  she  appeared  again  and  learned  to  know 
Niels  Lyhne,  for  she  was  not  at  all  afraid  of  people 
individually. 

No  one  needed  to  be  long  in  Madame  Odero's 
presence  before  finding  out  whether  she  liked  him 
or  not,  for  she  showed  it  with  sufficient  plainness. 
What  she  gave  Niels  Lyhne  to  see  was  very  encour- 
aging, and  they  had  not  been  alone  for  many  days 
in  the  magnificent  hotel  garden  with  its  pome- 
granates and  myrtles,  with  its  arbors  of  blossoming 
nerias  and  its  marvellous  view,  before  they  were  on 
very  friendly  terms. 

They  were  not  at  all  in  love  with  each  other,  or 
if  they  were,  it  was  not  very  serious.  It  was  one  of 
the  vague,  pleasant  intimacies  that  will  sometimes 


254  NIELS  LYHNE 

grow  up  between  men  and  women  who  are  past  the 
time  of  early  youth  when  nature  flames  up  and 
yearns  toward  an  unknown  bHss.  It  is  a  kind  of 
j  waning  summer,  in  which  people  promenade  deco- 
■  rously  side  by  side,  gather  themselves  into  graceful 
nosegays,  each  caressing  himself  with  the  other's 
hand  and  admiring  himself  with  the  other's  eyes. 
They  take  out  all  their  store  of  pretty  secrets,  all 
the  exquisite  useless  trifles  people  accumulate  like 
bric-a-brac  of  the  soul,  pass  them  from  hand  to  hand, 
turn  them  round  and  hold  them  up,  seeking  the 
most  artistic  light-efi^ect,  comparing  and  analyzing. 
It  is,  of  course,  only  when  life  passes  in  a  leisurely 
way  that  such  Sunday  friendships  are  possible,  and 
here  by  the  quiet  lake  these  two  had  plenty  of  time. 
Niels  had  made  a  beginning  by  draping  Madame 
Odero  in  a  becoming  robe  of  melancholy.  At  first, 
she  was  several  times  on  the  point  of  tearing  the 
whole  thing  off  and  revealing  herself  as  the  barba- 
rian she  was,  but  when  she  found  that  she  could 
wear  the  drapery  with  patrician  eflfect,  she  took  her 
melancholy  as  a  role,  and  not  only  stopped  slam- 
ming the  doors,  but  sought  out  the  moods  and 
emotions  in  herself  that  might  suit  her  new  pose. 
It  was  astonishing  how  she  came  to  realize  that  she 
had  actually  known  herself  very  little  in  the  past. 
Her  life  had,  in  fact,  been  too  eventful  and  exciting 
to  give  her  time  for  exploring  herself,  and  besides 
she  was  only  now  approaching  the  age  when  women 


CHAPTER  XII  255 

who  have  lived  much  in  the  world  and  seen  much 
commence  to  collect  their  memories,  to  look  back 
at  themselves  and  assemble  a  past. 

From  this  beginning,  their  intimacy  developed 
quickly  and  definitely  until  they  had  become  quite 
indispensable  to  each  other.  Each  led  only  a  half- 
hearted existence  without  the  other. 

Then  it  happened  one  morning,  as  Niels  was 
starting  out  for  a  sail,  that  he  heard  Madame  Odero 
singing  in  the  garden.  His  first  impulse  was  to  turn 
back  and  scold  her,  but  before  he  could  make  up 
his  mind,  the  boat  had  carried  him  out  of  hearing; 
the  wind  tempted  him  to  a  trip  to  Limone,  and  he 
meant  to  be  back  by  midday.  So  he  sailed  on. 

Madame  Odero  had  descended  into  the  garden 
earlier  than  usual.  The  fresh  fragrance  that  filled 
the  air, the  round  waves  rising  and  sinking  clear  and 
bright  as  glass  beneath  the  garden  wall,  and  all  this 
glory  of  color  everywhere  —  blue  lake  and  sun- 
scorched  mountains,  white  sails  flitting  across  the 
lake  and  red  flowers  arching  over  her  head  —  all 
this  and  with  it  a  dream  she  could  not  forget,  which 
went  on  throbbing  against  her  heart  .  .  .  She  could 
not  be  silent,  she  had  to  be  a  part  of  all  this  life. 

Therefore  she  sang. 

Fuller  and  fuller  rose  the  exultant  notes  of  her 
voice.  She  was  intoxicated  with  its  beauty,  she  trem- 
bled in  a  voluptuous  sense  of  its  power;  and  she 
went  on,  she  could  not  stop,  for  she  was  borne 


256  NIELS  LYHNE 

blissfully  along  on  wonderful  dreams  of  coming 
triumphs. 

No  weariness  followed.  She  could  leave,  leave  at 
once,  shake  off  the  nothingness  of  the  past  months, 
come  out  of  her  hiding  and  live! 

By  midday  everything  was  ready  for  her  depar- 
ture. 

Then,  just  as  the  carriages  drove  up  to  the  door, 
she  remembered  Niels  Lyhne.  She  dived  down 
into  her  pocket  for  a  paltry  little  note-book,  and 
scribbled  it  full  of  farewells  to  Niels,  for  the  pages 
were  so  small  that  each  could  hold  only  three  or  four 
words.  This  she  enclosed  in  an  envelope  for  him. 
and  departed. 

When  Niels  came  back  in  the  late  afternoon, 
after  being  detained  by  the  sanitary  police  in  Li- 
mone,  she  had  long  since  reached  Mori  and  taken 
the  train. 

He  was  not  surprised,  only  sorry,  and  not  at  all 
angry.  He  could  even  smile  resignedly  at  this  new 
hostile  thrust  of  fate.  But  in  the  evening,  when  he 
sat  in  the  empty  moonlit  garden  telling  the  inn- 
keeper's little  boy  the  story  about  the  princess  who 
found  her  wings  again  and  flew  away  from  her  lover 
back  to  the  land  of  fairies,  he  was  seized  with  an 
intolerable  longing  for  Lonborggaard.  He  yearned 
to  feel  something  closing  around  him  like  a  home 
and  holding  him  fast,  no  matter  how.  He  could 
not  bear  the  indiff^erence  of  life  any  longer,  could 


CHAPTER  XII  257 

not  endure  being  cast  off  and  thrown  back  on  him- 
self again  and  again.  No  home  on  earth,  no  God  in 
heaven,  no  goal  out  there  in  the  future !  He  would 
at  least  have  a  home.  He  would  make  it  his  own  by 
loving  everything  there,  big  and  little,  every  rock, 
every  tree,  the  animate  and  the  inanimate;  he  would 
portion  out  his  heart  to  it  all  so  that  it  could  never 
cast  him  off  any  more. 


Chapter  XIII 

FOR  about  a  year,  Niels  Lyhne  had  lived  at 
Lonborggaard,  managing  the  farm  as  well  as 
he  knew  how  and  as  much  as  his  old  steward  would 
let  him.  He  had  taken  down  his  shield,  blotted 
out  his  'scutcheon,  and  resigned.  Humanity  would 
have  to  get  along  without  him ;  he  had  learned  to 
know  the  joy  found  in  purely  physical  labor,  in  see- 
ing the  pile  growing  under  his  hand,  in  being  able 
to  get  through  with  what  he  was  doing  so  that  he 
really  was  through,  in  knowing  that  when  he  went 
away  tired  the  strength  that  he  had  used  up  lay 
behind  him  in  his  work,  and  the  work  would  stand 
and  not  be  eaten  up  by  doubt  in  the  night  or  dis- 
persed by  the  breath  of  criticism  on  the  morning 
after.  There  were  no  Sisyphus  stones  in  agriculture. 

What  a  joy  it  was,  too,  when  he  had  worked  till 
he  was  tired,  to  go  to  bed  and  gather  strength  in 
sleep  and  to  spend  it  again,  as  regularly  as  day  and 
night  follow  one  upon  the  other,  never  hindered 
by  the  caprices  of  his  brain,  never  having  to  han- 
dle himself  gingerly  like  a  tuned  guitar  with  loose 
pegs. 

He  was  really  happy  in  a  quiet  way,  and  often 
he  would  sit,  as  his  father  had  sat,  on  a  stile  or  a 
boundary  stone,  staring  out  over  the  golden  wheat 
or  the  topheavy  oats,  in  a  strange,  vegetative  trance. 

As  yet  he  had  not  begun  to  seek  the  society  of 


CHAPTER  XIII  259 

the  neighboring  families,  except  Councillor  Skin- 
nerup's  in  Varde,  whom  he  visited  quite  frequently. 

The  Skinnerups  had  come  to  town  while  his 
father  was  still  living,  and  as  the  Councillor  was  an 
old  university  friend  of  Lyhne's,  the  two  families 
had  seen  much  of  each  other.  Skinnerup,  a  mild, 
bald-headed  man  with  sharp  features  and  kind  eyes, 
was  now  a  widower,  but  his  house  was  more  than 
filled  by  his  four  daughters,  the  eldest  seventeen, 
the  youngest  twelve  years  old. 

The  Councillor  had  read  much,  and  Niels  en- 
joyed a  chat  with  him  on  various  esthetic  subjects, 
for  though  he  had  learned  to  use  his  hands,  that,  of 
course,  did  not  turn  him  into  a  country  bumpkin 
all  at  once.  He  was  rather  amused  sometimes  at 
the  almost  absurd  care  he  had  to  exercise  whenever 
the  conversation  turned  to  a  comparison  between 
Danish  and  foreign  literature  and,  in  fact,  whenever 
Denmark  was  measured  against  something  not 
Danish.  Caution  was  absolutely  necessary,  however, 
for  the  mild-mannered  Councillor  was  one  of  the 
fierce  patriots,  occasionally  met  with  in  those  days, 
who  might  grudgingly  admit  that  Denmark  was 
not  the  greatest  of  the  world  powers,  but  when  so 
much  was  said  would  not  subscribe  to  a  jot  or  a 
tittle  more  that  might  place  his  country  or  anything 
pertaining  to  it  anywhere  but  in  the  lead. 

These  conversations  had  another  charm,  which 
Niels  felt  at  first  vaguely  and  without  consciously 


26o  NIELS  LYHNE 

thinking  of  it,  in  the  look  of  deHghted  admiration 
with  which  seventeen-year-old  Gerda's  eyes  fol- 
lowed him  as  he  spoke.  She  always  managed  to  be 
present  when  he  came,  and  would  listen  so  eagerly 
that  he  often  saw  her  flushing  with  rapture  when 
he  said  something  that  seemed  to  her  especially 
beautiful. 

The  truth  was,  he  had  unwittingly  become  this 
young  lady's  ideal,  at  first  chiefly  because  he  often 
rode  into  town  wearing  a  gray  mantle  of  a  very 
foreign  and  romantic  cut,  then  because  he  always 
said  Milano  instead  of  Milan,  and  Anally  because 
he  was  alone  in  the  world  and  had  rather  a  sad 
countenance.  There  were  certainly  a  great  many 
ways  in  which  he  diff^ered  from  the  rest  of  the  people 
in  Varde  and  in  Ringkjobing  too. 

On  a  hot  summer  day,  Niels  came  through  the 
narrow  street  behind  the  Councillor's  garden.  The 
sun  was  pouring  down  over  the  brick-red  little 
houses,  and  the  ships  lying  out  on  the  sound  had 
mats  hung  over  their  sides  to  prevent  the  tar  from 
melting  and  oozing  out  of  the  seams.  Round  about 
him  everything  was  open  to  admit  a  coolness  which 
did  not  exist.  Within  the  open  doors,  the  children 
were  reading  their  lessons  aloud,  and  the  lium  of 
their  voices  mingled  with  that  of  the  bees  in  the 
garden,  while  a  flock  of  sparrows  hopped  silently 


CHAPTER  XIII  261 

from  tree  to  tree,  all  flying  up  together  and  coming 
down  together.  .^■ 

Niels  entered  a  little  house  right  behind  the 
garden,  and  while  the  woman  went  to  bring  her 
husband  from  the  neighbor's,  he  was  left  alone  in 
a  spotless  little  room  smelling  of  gillyflowers  and 
freshly  ironed  linen. 

When  he  had  examined  the  pictures  on  the  walls, 
the  two  dogs  on  the  dresser,  and  the  sea-shells  on 
the  lid  of  the  work-box,  he  stepped  over  to  the  open 
window,  whence  he  heard  the  sound  of  Gerda's 
voice,  and  there  were  the  four  Skinnerup  girls  on 
the  Councillor's  bleaching-green  only  a  few  steps 
away. 

The  balsamines  and  other  flowers  in  the  window 
hid  him,  and  he  prepared  himself  both  to  listen  and 
to  look. 

It  was  clear  that  a  quarrel  was  going  on,  and  the 
three  younger  sisters  were  making  common  cause 
against  Gerda.  All  carried  whips  of  lemon-yellow 
withes.  The  youngest  had  formed  three  or  four  of 
them  into  rings  wound  about  with  red  bark,  and  had 
put  them  on  her  head  like  a  turban. 

It  was  she  who  was  speaking. 

"She  says  he  looks  like  Themistocles  on  the 
stove  in  the  study,"  she  remarked  to  her  fellow 
conspirators,  and  turned  up  her  eyes  with  a  rapt 
expression. 


262  NIELS  LYHNE 

"Oh,  pshaw,"  said  the  middle  one, a  saucy  little 
lady  who  had  just  been  confirmed  that  spring; 
"do  you  suppose  Themistocles  was  round-shoul- 
dered?" She  imitated  Niels  Lyhne's  slight  stoop. 
"Themistocles!  Not  much!" 

"There  is  something  so  manly  in  his  look;  he 
is  a  real  man!"  quoted  the  twelve-year-old. 

"  He ! "  came  the  voice  of  the  middle  one  again. 
"  Why,  he  goes  and  pours  eau  de  cologne  on  him- 
self. The  other  day  his  gloves  were  lying  there  and 
just  simply  reeking  with  millefleur." 

^^ Every  perfection !"  breathed  the  twelve-year- 
old  in  ecstasy,  and  staggered  back  as  though  over- 
come with  emotion. 

They  addressed  all  these  remarks  to  each  other 
and  pretended  not  to  notice  Gerda,  who  stood  at  a 
little  distance,  blushing  furiously,  as  she  poked  the 
ground  with  her  yellow  stick.  Suddenly  she  lifted 
her  head. 

"  You  're  a  pair  of  naughty  hussies,"  she  said, "  to 
talk  like  that  about  some  one  who  is  too  good  to 
look  at  you." 

"  And  yet  you  know  he  is  only  a  mortal,"  remon- 
strated the  eldest  of  the  three  mildly,  as  if  to  make 
peace. 

"No,  he  is  nothing  of  the  kind." 

"And  surely  he  has  his  faults,"  continued  the 
sister,  pretending  not  to  hear  what  Gerda  said. 

"No!" 


CHAPTER  XIII  263 

"  But,  my  dear  Gerda,  you  know  he  never  goes 
to  church." 

"What  should  he  go  there  for?  He  knows  ever 
so  much  more  than  the  pastor." 

"Yes,  but  unfortunately  he  doesn't  believe  in 
any  God  at  all,  Gerda." 

"Well,  you  can  be  mighty  sure,  my  dear,  that  if 
he  doesn't,  he  has  excellent  reasons  for  it." 

"Why,  Gerda,  how  can  you  say  such  a  thing!" 

"You'd  almost  think  —  "broke  in  the  middle 
one. 

"What  would  you  almost  think?"  snapped 
Gerda. 

"  Nothing,  nothing  at  all.  Please  don't  bite  me ! " 
replied  the  sister  with  a  sudden  air  of  great  meek- 
ness. 

"Now  will  you  tell  me  this  minute  what  you 
meant!" 

"  No,  no,  no,  no,  no ;  I  guess  I  've  a  right  to  hold 
my  tongue  if  I  want  to." 

She  walked  off  together  with  the  twelve-year- 
old,  each  with  her  arm  around  the  other's  shoulder 
in  sisterly  concord.  The  eldest  followed  them,  strut- 
ting with  indignation. 

Gerda,  left  alone,  stood  looking  defiantly  straight 
ahead,  while  she  cut  the  air  with  her  yellow  stick. 

There  was  a  moment  of  silence,  and  then  the  thin 
voice  of  the  twelve-year-old  floated  up  from  the 
other  end  of  the  garden,  singing: 


264  NIELS  LYHNE 

"  Tlju  ask  me^  my  lad^ 
What  I  want  with  the  wither edjlQwer — " 

Niels  understood  their  teasing  perfectly,  for  he 
had  recently  made  Gerda  a  present  of  a  book  with 
a  dried  vine  leaf  from  the  garden  in  Verona  which 
contains  Juliet's  grave.  He  could  hardly  keep  from 
laughing;  but  just  then  the  woman  returned  with 
her  husband,  whom  she  had  at  last  found,  and  Niels 
had  to  give  the  order  for  the  carpenter  work  he  had 
come  to  see  about. 

From  that  day  Niels  observed  Gerda  more  close- 
ly, and  every  time  he  saw  her  he  felt  more  keenly 
how  sweet  and  fine  she  was.  As  time  went  on,  his 
thoughts  turned  more  and  more  frequently  to  this 
confiding  little  girl. 

She  was  very  lovely,  with  the  tender,  appealing 
beauty  that  almost  brings  tears  to  the  eyes.  Her 
figure,  in  its  early  ripening,  retained  something 
of  the  child's  roundness,  which  gave  an  air  of  in- 
nocence to  her  luxuriant  womanhood.  The  small, 
softly-moulded  hands  were  losing  the  rosy  color  of 
adolescence,  and  were  without  any  of  the  restless, 
nervous  curiosity  often  seen  at  that  age.  She  had  a 
strong  little  neck,  cheeks  that  were  rounded  with 
a  large,  full  line,  and  a  low,  dreamy  little  woman's 
forehead,  where  great  thoughts  were  strangers  and 
almost  seemed  to  hurt  when  they  came,  bringing  a 
frown  to  the  thick  brows.  And  her  eye — how  deep 


CHAPTER  XIII  265 

and  blue  it  lay  there,  but  deep  only  as  a  lake  where 
one  can  see  the  bottom;  and  in  the  soft  corners  the 
smile  brooded  happily  under  lids  that  were  lifted 
in  slow  surprise.  This  was  the  way  she  looked,  little 
Gerda,  white  and  pink  and  blonde,  with  all  her 
short,  bright  hair  demurely  gathered  into  a  knot. 

They  had  many  a  talk,  Niels  and  Gerda,  and 
he  fell  more  and  more  in  love  with  her.  Open  and 
frank  and  chivalrous  was  his  regard,  until  a  certain  ; 
day  there  came  a  change  in  the  air  about  them,  a  i 
gleam  of  that  which  is  too  imponderable  to  be  called 
sensuousness  and  yet  is  of  the  senses,  that  which' 
impels  the  hand  and  mouth  and  eyes  to  reach  out  \ 
for  what  the  heart  cannot  get  close  enough  to  its 
own  heart.  And  another  day,  not  long  after,  Niels 
went  to  Gerda's  father,  because  Gerda  was  so  young, 
and  because  he  was  so  sure  of  her  love.  And  her 
father  said  yes,  and  Gerda  said  yes. 

In  the  spring  they  were  married.  ^ 


It  seemed  to  Niels  Lyhne  that  existence  had  grown 
wonderfully  clear  and  uncomplicated,  that  life  was 
simple  to  live  and  happiness  as  near  and  easy  to 
win  as  the  air  he  drew  in  with  his  breath. 

He  loved  her,  the  young  wife  he  had  won,  with 
all  the  delicacy  of  thought  and  feeling,  with  all  the 
large,  deep  tenderness  of  a  man  who  knows  the 
tendency  of  love  to  sink  and  believes  in  the  power 


266  NIELS  LYHNE 

of  love  to  rise.  How  he  guarded  this  young  soul 
which  bent  toward  him  with  infinite  trust  and 
pressed  up  against  him  in  caressing  faith,  in  implicit 
reliance  that  he  would  do  her  nothing  but  good,  as 
the  ewe  lamb  in  the  parable  must  have  felt  toward 
its  shepherd  when  it  ate  from  his  hand  and  drank 
of  his  cup !  He  had  no  heart  to  take  her  God  away 
from  her  or  to  banish  all  those  white  hosts  of  angels 
that  fly  singing  through  the  heavens  all  day  and 
come  to  earth  at  eventide  and  spread  their  wings 
from  bed  to  bed,  watching  faithfully  and  filling  the 
darkness  of  night  with  a  protecting  wall  of  invisible 
light.  He  shrank  from  allowing  his  own  heavier, 
imageless  view  of  life  to  come  between  her  and  the 
soft  blue  of  the  heavens  and  make  her  feel  uneasy 
and  forsaken. 

But  she  would  have  it  otherwise.  She  wanted  to 
share  everything  with  him ;  there  must  be  no  place 
in  heaven  or  on  earth  where  their  ways  were  parted. 
Say  what  he  would  to  hold  her  back,  she  met  it  all, 
if  not  with  the  words  of  the  Moabite  woman,  yet 
with  the  same  obstinate  thought  that  lay  in  the 
words  —  thy  people  shall  be  my  people,  and  thy 
God  my  God. 

Then  he  began  to  teach  her  in  earnest.  He  ex- 
plained to  her  that  all  gods  were  the  work  of  men 
and,  like  everything  else  made  by  men,  could  not 
endure  eternally,  but  must  pass  away,  generation 
after  generation  of  gods  —  because  humanity  is  ever- 


CHAPTER  XIII  267 

lastingly  developing  and  growing  beyond  its  own 
ideals.  A  god  on  whom  the  noblest  and  greatest  of 
men  could  not  lavish  the  richest  gifts  of  their  spirit, 
a  god  that  did  not  take  his  light  from  men,  but  had 
to  give  light  by  virtue  of  his  own  being,  a  god  that 
was  not  developing  but  stiffened  in  the  historic 
plaster  of  dogmas,  was  no  longer  a  god,  but  an  idol. 
Therefore  Judaism  was  right  against  Baal  and  As- 
tarte,  and  Christianity  was  right  against  Judaism, 
for  an  idol  is  nothing  in  the  world.  Humanity  had 
gone  on  from  god  to  god,  and  therefore  Christ  could 
say,  on  the  one  hand,  looking  toward  the  old  God, 
that  He  had  not  come  to  destroy  the  law,  but  to 
fulfil  it,  while  on  the  other  hand  He  could  point 
beyond  Himself  to  a  yet  higher  ideal  with  those 
mystical  words  about  the  sin  that  shall  not  be  for- 
given, the  sin  against  the  Holy  Ghost. 

He  went  on  to  teach  her  how  the  belief  in  a 
personal  God  who  guides  everything  for  the  best 
and  who  punishes  and  rewards  beyond  the  grave'V 
is  a  running  away  from  the  harsh  realities  of  life,  an  / 
impotent  attempt  to  take  the  sting  from  its  arbi- 
trariness. He  showed  her  that  it  must  blunt  com- 
passion and  make  people  less  ready  to  exert  all  their 
powers  in  relieving  misery,  since  they  could  soothe 
themselves  with  the  thought  that  suffering  in  this 
brief  earthly  life  paved  the  way  for  the  sufferer  to 
an  eternity  of  glory  and  joy. 

He  laid  stress  on  the  strength  and  self-reliance 


268  NIELS  LYHNE 

mankind  would  gain  when  men  had  learned  faith  in 
themselves,  and  when  the  individual  strove  to  bring 
his  life  into  harmony  with  what  seemed  to  him,  in 
his  best  moments,  the  highest  that  dwelt  in  him, in- 
stead of  seeking  it  outside  of  himself  in  a  controlling 
deity.  He  made  his  faith  as  beautiful  and  blessed 
as  he  could,  but  he  did  not  conceal  from  her  how 
•  crushingly  sad  and  comfortless  the  truth  of  atheism 
/  would  seem  in  the  hour  of  sorrow  compared  to  the 
old  fair,  happy  dream  of  a  Heavenly  Father  who 
/  guides  and  rules.  Yet  she  was  brave.  It  is  true,  many 
.^   of  his  doctrines,and  often  those  he  had  least  expected 
•  to  affect  her,  would  shake  her  to  the  innermost 
depths  of  her  soul,  but  her  faith  knew  no  bounds; 
her  love  carried  her  with  him  away  from  all  heavens, 
and  she  believed  because  she  loved.  Then,  after  a 
while,  when  the  new  ideas  had  grown  familiar  and 
homelike,  she  became  intolerant  in  the  highest  de- 
gree and  fanatical,  as  young  disciples  always  are  who 
love  their  master  intensely.  Niels  often  reproached 
her  for  it,  but  that  was  the  one  thing  she  could 
never  understand — that  when  their  belief  was  true, 
that  of  others  should  not  be  horrible  and  reprehen- 
sible. 
/       For  three  years  they  lived  happily  together,  and 
much  of  this  happiness  shone  from  a  baby  face,  the 
face  of  a  little  boy  who  had  been  born  to  them  in 
the  second  year  of  their  marriage. 

Happiness   usually    makes    people   good,   and 


CHAPTER  XIII  269 

Niels  strove  earnestly  to  make  their  lives  so  beauti-  , 
ful,  noble,  and  useful  that  there  should  never  be  any  : 
pause  in  the  growth  of  their  souls  toward  the  human 
ideal  in  which  they  both  believed.  But  he  no  longer  } 
thought  of  carrying  the  standard  of  his  ideal  out 
into  the  world;  he  was  content  to  follow  it.  Once  in 
a  while,  he  would  take  out  some  of  his  old  attempts, 
and  then  he  would  always  wonder  if  it  was  really 
he  who  had  written  these  pretty,  artistic  things.  His 
own  verses  invariably  brought  tears  to  his  eyes^ 
but  he  would  not  for  anything  in  the  world  have 
changed  places  with  the  poor  fellow  who  wrote 
them. 

Suddenly,  in  the  spring,  Gerda  fell  ill  and  could 
not  recover. 

Early  one  morning  —  it  was  the  last — Niels  was 
sitting  up  with  her.  The  sun  was  about  to  rise  and 
cast  a  red  glow  on  the  white  shade  curtains,  al- 
though the  light  coming  in  on  either  side  was  still 
blue,  making  blue  shadows  in  the  folds  of  the  white 
bed-spread  and  under  Gerda's  pale,  thin  hands, 
which  lay  clasped  before  her  on  the  sheet.  Her  cap 
had  slipped  off,  and,  as  her  head  lay  far  back  on 
the  pillow,  her  features,  sharpened  and  refined  by 
suffering,  had  an  unfamiliar  and  strangely  distin- 
guished air.  She  moved  her  lips  as  if  to  moisten 
them,  and  Niels  reached  for  a  glass  holding  a  dark 
red  liquid,  but  she  shook  her  head  faintly.  Then 
suddenly  she  turned  her  face  to  him  and  gazed 


270  NIELS  LYHNE 

anxiously  into  his  mournful  countenance.  As  she 
looked  at  the  deep  sorrow  his  face  revealed  and  the 
despair  it  could  not  hide,  her  uneasy  foreboding 
gradually  changed  to  a  terrible  certainty. 

She  struggled  to  rise,  but  could  not. 

Niels  bent  over  her  quickly,  and  she  caught  his 
hand. 

"Is  it  death?"  she  asked,  lowering  her  weak 
voice  as  if  she  could  not  bear  to  speak  the  words. 

He  could  only  look  at  her,  while  his  breath  came 
in  a  deep,  moaning  sigh. 

Gerda  clutched  his  hand  and  threw  herself  over 
to  him  in  her  fear.  "  I  don't  dare  to,"  she  said. 

He  slid  down  on  his  knees  by  the  bed  and  put 
his  arm  under  the  pillow  so  that  he  almost  held  her 
to  his  breast.  He  could  hardly  see  her  for  the  tears 
that  blinded  him  as  they  coursed  down  his  cheeks 
one  after  another,  and  he  lifted  her  hand  with  a 
corner  of  the  sheet  to  his  eyes.  Then  he  mastered 
his  voice. "Tell  me  everything, Gerda  dear;  never 
mind  me.  Is  it  the  pastor?"  He  could  hardly  believe 
it  was  that,  and  there  was  a  note  of  doubt  in  his 
voice. 

She  did  not  answer,  but  closed  her  eyes  and  drew 
her  head  back  a  little  as  if  to  be  alone  with  her 
thoughts. 

A  few  minutes  passed.  The  soft,  long-drawn 
whistle  of  a  blackbird  sounded  underneath  the 
windows;  then  another  whistled  and  another;  a 


CHAPTER  XIII  271 

whole  series  of  flute-like  notes  shot  through  the 
silence  of  the  room. 

Then  she  looked  up  again.  "If  you  were  with 
me,"  she  said,  and  she  leaned  more  heavily  on  the 
pillow  that  he  supported.  There  was  a  caress  in  her 
movement,  and  he  felt  it.  "If  you  were  with  me! 
But  alone!" 

She  drew  his  hand  toward  her  feebly  and  dropped 
it  again.  "I  don't  dare  to."  Her  eyes  were  full  of 
fear.  "You  must  fetch  him,  Niels,  I  don't  dare 
to  come  up  there  alone  like  this.  We  had  never 
thought  that  I  should  die  first;  it  was  always  you 
who  went  before.  Yes,  I  know  —  but  suppose,  after 
all,  we  have  been  mistaken;  we  might  have  been 
mistaken,  Niels,  mightn't  we?  You  don't  think  so, 
but  it  would  be  strange  \i  every  body  s\\o\x\d  be  wrong, 
and  if  there  wasn't  anything  at  all — those  big 
churches  and  the  bells  when  they  bury  people — I 
have  always  been  so  fond  of  the  bells."  She  lay  quite 
still  as  if  she  were  listening  for  them  and  could  hear 
them. 

"  It  is  impossible,  Niels,  that  it  should  all  be  over 
when  we  die.  You  don't  feel  it,  you  who  are  well, 
you  think  it  must  kill  us  quite,  because  we  are  so 
weak,  and  everything  seems  to  pass  away,  but  it  is\^ 
only  the  world  outside,  within  us  there  is  as  much 
soul  as  before.  It  is  there,  Niels;  I  have  it  all  within 
me,  everything  that  has  been  given  me,  the  same 
infinite  world,  but  more  quiet,  more  alone  with  my- 


/ 


272  NIELS  LYHNE 

self,  as  when  you  close  your  eyes.  It  is  just  like  a 
candle,  Niels,  that  is  being  carried  away  from  you 
into  the  darkness,  into  the  darkness,  and  it  seems 
to  you  fainter  and  fainter  and  fainter,  and  you  can't 
see  it,  but  still  it  is  shining  over  there  where  it  is  — 
far  away.  I  always  thought  I  should  live  to  be  such 
an  old,  old  woman,  and  that  I  should  stay  here  with 
you  all,  and  now  they  won't  let  me,  they  are  taking 
me  away  from  house  and  home  and  making  me  go 
all  alone.  I  am  afraid,  Niels,  that  where  I  am  going 
it  is  God  who  rules,  and  He  cares  nothing  for  our 
\  cleverness  here  on  earth.  He  wants  His  own  way 
and  nothing  else,  but  somehow  everything  of  His 
is  so  far  away  from  me.  I  have  not  done  anything 
very  wicked,  have  I?  But  it  is  n't  that  .  .  .  Go  and 
get  the  pastor,  I  want  him  so  much." 

Niels  rose  and  went  for  the  pastor  at  once;  he 
was  grateful  that  this  had  not  come  at  the  very  last 
moment. 

The  pastor  came  and  was  left  alone  with  Gerda. 

He  was  a  handsome,  middle-aged  man  with 
finely  cut,  regular  features  and  large  brown  eyes. 
He  knew,  of  course,  Niels  Lyhne's  attitude  to  the 
church,  and  now  and  then  some  expressions  of  hos- 
tility that  sprang  from  the  young  wife's  fanaticism 
had  been  reported  to  him ;  but  he  never  for  a  mo- 
ment thought  of  speaking  to  her  as  to  a  heathen 
or  an  apostate,  for  he  understood  perfectly  that  it 
was  only  her  love  that  had  led  her  astray,  and  he 


CHAPTER  XIII  273 

also  understood  the  feeling  that  impelled  her,  now 
that  love  could  no  longer  follow  her,  to  seek  recon- 
ciliation with  the  God  she  had  once  known.  There- 
fore he  tried  in  his  talk  with  her  to  wake  her  dor- 
mant memories  by  reading  to  her  the  passages  from 
the  Gospels  and  the  hymns  that  he  thought  would 
be  most  familiar  to  her. 

He  was  not  mistaken. 

The  words  woke  intimate  and  solemn  echoes 
in  her  soul  like  the  pealing  of  bells  on  Christmas 
morning.  Instantly  there  was  spread  before  her  eyes 
the  land  where  our  fancy  is  first  of  all  at  home, 
where  Joseph  dreamed  and  David  sang,  and  where 
the  ladder  stands  that  reaches  from  earth  to  heaven. 
It  lay  there  with  figs  andmulberries,and  the  Jordan 
gleamed  like  clearest  silver  in  the  morning  mist; 
Jerusalem  stood  red  and  sombre  under  the  setting 
sun;  but  over  Bethlehem  there  was  always  glorious 
night  with  great  stars  in  the  deep  blue  vault.  How 
her  childhood  faith  welled  up  once  more!  She  was 
again  the  little  girl  who  went  to  church  clinging  to 
her  mother's  hand  and  sat  there  shivering  with  cold 
and  wondering  why  people  sinned  so  much.  Then 
she  grew  to  full  stature  again  under  the  lofty  words 
of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  and  she  lay  there 
like  a  prostrate  sinner  while  the  pastor  spoke  of  the 
sacred  mysteries  of  baptism  and  of  holy  commun- 
ion. At  last  the  true  longing  arose  in  her  heart,  the 
meek  kneeling  before  the  omnipotent  and  judging 


274  NIELS  LYHNE 

God,  the  bitter  tears  of  remorse  before  the  betrayed 
and  reviled  and  tortured  God,  and  the  humbly  au- 
dacious desire  for  the  new  covenant  of  wine  and 
bread  with  the  hidden  God. 

The  pastor  left  her.  Toward  noon  he  came  back 
and  gave  her  the  sacrament. 

Her  strength  waned  in  a  fitful  flicker;  yet  at  dusk, 
when  Niels  took  her  in  his  arms  for  the  last  time  to 
say  farewell  before  the  shadows  of  death  approached 
/too  near,  she  was  fully  conscious.  But  the  love  that 
had  been  the  purest  joy  of  his  life  had  died  out  of 
her  eyes ;  she  was  no  longer  his ;  even  now  her  wings 
were  growing,,  and  she  yearned  only  for  her  God. 

At  midnight  she  died. 
''  They  were  dreary  months  that  followed.  Time 
seemed  to  swell  up  into  something  enormous  and 
hostile ;  every  day  was  an  unending  desert  of  empti- 
ness, every  night  a  hell  of  memories.  The  summer 
was  almost  over  before  the  rushing,  frothing  tor- 
rent of  his  grief  had  hollowed  out  a  river-bed  in  his 
soul  where  it  could  flow  in  a  turgid,  murmuring 
stream  of  sadness  and  longing. 

Then  it  happened  one  day  that  he  came  home 
from  the  fields  and  found  his  little  boy  very  ill.  The 
child  had  been  ailing  for  the  last  few  days  and  had 
been  restless  in  the  night,  but  no  one  had  believed 
it  to  be  anything  serious;  now  he  lay  in  his  little 
bed  hot  and  cold  with  fever  and  moaning  with  pain. 

The  carriage  was  instantly  sent  to  Varde  for  a 


CHAPTER  XIII  275 

physician,  but  none  of  the  doctors  were  at  home, 
and  it  had  to  wait  for  hours.  At  bedtime  it  had  not 
yet  returned. 

Niels  sat  by  the  child's  cot.  Every  half  hour  or 
oftener  he  would  send  some  one  out  to  listen  and 
look  for  the  carriage.  A  mounted  messenger  was 
also  despatched  to  meet  it,  but  he  failed  to  see  any 
carriage  and  rode  all  the  way  to  Varde. 

This  waiting  for  help  that  did  not  come  made 
it  all  the  more  agonizing  to  watch  the  suffering  of 
the  sick  child.  The  malady  made  rapid  progress. 
Toward  eleven  the  first  attack  of  convulsions  set  in, 
and  after  that  they  came  again  and  again  at  shorter 
and  shorter  intervals. 

A  little  after  one,  the  mounted  messenger  re- 
turned, saying  that  the  carriage  could  not  be  ex- 
pected for  some  hours  yet,  as  none  of  the  doctors 
had  been  at  home  when  he  rode  out  of  town. 

Then  Niels  broke  down.  He  had  fought  against 
his  despair  as  longas  there  was  any  hope,  but  now  he 
could  fight  no  more.  He  went  into  the  dark  parlor 
adjoining  the  sick-room  and  stared  out  through  the 
dusky  panes, while  his  nails  dug  into  the  wood  ofthe 
casement.  His  eyes  seemed  to  burrow  into  the  dark-^ 
ness  for  some  hope;  his  brain  crouched  for  a  spring 
up  toward  a  miracle ;  then  suddenly  all  was  still  and 
clear  for  an  instant,  and  in  the  clearness  he  turned 
away  from  the  window  to  a  table  standing  there, 
threw  himself  over  it,  and  sobbed  without  tears. 


276  NIELS  LYHNE 

When  he  came  into  the  sick-room  again,  the 
child  was  in  convulsions.  He  looked  at  it  as  if  he 
would  stab  himself  to  death  with  the  sight:  the  tiny 
hands,  clenched  and  white,  with  bluish  nails,  the 
staring  eyes  turning  in  their  sockets,  the  distorted 
mouth,  and  the  teeth  grinding  with  a  sound  like 
iron  on  stone — it  was  terrible,  and  yet  that  was  not 
the  worst.  No,  but  when  the  convulsions  ceased  and 
the  body  grew  soft  again,  relaxing  with  the  happy 
relief  of  lessened  pain,  then  to  see  the  terror  that 
came  into  the  child's  eyes  when  it  felt  the  first  faint 
approach  of  the  convulsions  returning,  the  growing 
prayer  for  help  when  the  pain  came  nearer  and  yet 
nearer —  to  see  this  and  not  be  able  to  help,  not  with 
his  heart's  blood,  not  with  all  he  possessed!  He 
lifted  his  clenched  hands  threateningly  to  heaven, 
he  caught  up  his  child  in  a  mad  impulse  of  flight, 
and  then  he  threw  himself  down  on  the  floor  on  his 
knees,  praying  to  the  Lord  Who  is  in  heaven.  Who 
keeps  the  earth  in  fear  through  trials  and  chastise- 
ments. Who  sends  want  and  sickness,  suffering  and 
death.  Who  demands  that  every^  knee  shall  bend  to 
Him  in  trembling, from  Whom  no  flight  is  possible 
—  either  at  the  uttermost  ends  of  the  ocean  or  in 
the  depths  of  the  earth  —  He,  the  God  Who,  if  it 
pleases  Him,  will  tread  the  one  you  love  best  under 
His  foot,  torture  him  back  into  the  dust  from  which 
He  himself  created  him. 

With  such  thoughts,  Niels  Lyhne  sent  prayers 


CHAPTER  XIII  277 

up  to  the  God;  he  threw  himself  down  in  utter 
abandonment  before  the  heavenly  throne,  confess- 
ing that  His  was  the  power  and  His  alone. 

Still  the  child  suffered. 

Toward  morning,  when  the  old  family  physician 
drove  in  through  the  gate,  Niels  was  alone. 


Chapter  XIV 

AUTUMN  had  come;  there  were  no  flowers  any 
.  more  on  the  graves  up  there  in  the  church- 
yard, and  the  fallen  leaves  lay  brown  and  moldering 
in  the  wet  under  the  trees  of  Lonborggard. 

Niels  Lyhne  went  about  in  the  empty  rooms 
in  bitter  despondency.  Something  had  given  way  in 
him  the  night  the  child  died.  He  had  lost  faith  in 
\  himself,  lost  his  belief  in  the  power  of  human  be- 
\  ings  to  bear  the  life  they  had  to  live.  Existence  had 
sprung  a  leak,  and  its  contents  were  seeping  out 
through  all  the  cracks  without  plan  or  purpose. 

It  was  of  no  avail  that  he  called  the  prayer  he  had 
prayed  a  father's  frenzied  cry  for  help  for  his  child, 
even  though  he  knew  none  could  hear  his  cry.  He 
had  known  well  what  he  did  even  in  the  depths  of 
his  despair.  He  had  been  tempted  and  had  fallen; 
for  it  was  a  fall,  a  betrayal  of  himself  and  his  ideal. 
No  doubt  tradition  had  been  too  strong  in  his 
blood.  Humanity  had  cried  to  heaven  in  its  agony 
for  many  thousands  of  years,  and  he  had  yielded  to 
an  inherited  instinct.  But  he  ought  to  have  resisted 
it,  for  he  knew  with  the  innermost  fibres  of  his 
brain  that  gods  were  dreams,  and  he  knew  that  when 
he  prayed  he  was  taking  refuge  in  a  dream,  just  as 
surely  as  he  knew  in  the  old  days,  when  he  threw 
himself  into  the  arms  of  his  fancies,  that  they  were 
fancies.  He  had  not  been  able  to  bear  life  as  it  was. 


CHAPTER  XIV  279 

He  had  taken  part  in  the  battle  for  the  highest,  and 
in  the  stress  of  the  fight  he  had  deserted  the  banner 
to  which  he  had  sworn  allegiance;  for  after  all^^the 
new  ideal,  atheism,  the  sacred  cause  of  truth  —  what 
did  it  all  mean,  what  was  it  all  but  tinsel  names  for 
the  one  simple  thing:jto_bear  life  aait  was!  To  bear 
life  as  it  was  and  allow  life  to  shape  itself  according 
to  its  own  laws! 

It  seemed  to  him  as  though  his  life  had  ended  in 
that  night  of  agony.  What  came  after  was  no  more 
than  meaningless  scenes  tacked  on  after  the  fifth 
act  when  the  action  was  already  finished.  He  could, 
of  course,  take  up  his  old  principles  again,  if  he  felt 
so  inclined,  but  he  had  once  fallen  the  fall,  and 
whether  or  not  he  would  fall  again  mattered  abso- 
lutely nothing. 

This  was  the  mood  that  possessed  him  most 
frequently. 

Then  came  the  November  day  when  the  King 
died,  and  war  seemed  more  and  more  imminent.  / 

He  soon  arranged  his  affairs  in  Lonborggaard 
and  enlisted  as  a  volunteer.  ' 

The  monotony  of  training  was  easy  to  bear,  for 
it  seemed  wonderful  only  to  know  that  he  was  no 
longer  superfluous,  and  when  he  was  assigned  to 
active  service,  the  everlasting  fight  against  cold, 
vermin,  and  discomforts  of  every  kind  drove  his 
thoughts  home  and  kept  them  from  going  farther 
afield  than  to  what  was  right  before  his  door.  He 


28o  NIELS  LYHNE 

grew  almost  cheerful  over  it,  and  his  health,  which 
had  suffered  under  the  griefs  of  the  past  year,  was 
fully  restored. 

On  a  gloomy  day  in  March  he  was  shot  in  the 
chest. 

Hjerrild, who  was  a  physician  in  the  hospital,  had 
him  put  into  a  small  room  where  there  were  only 
four  beds.  One  of  the  men  in  there  had  been  shot  in 
the  spine  and  lay  quite  still.  Another  was  wounded 
in  the  breast  and  lay  talking  deliriously  for  hours 
at  a  time  in  quick,  abrupt  phrases.  The  third,  who 
lay  nearest  Niels,  was  a  great,  strong  peasant  lad 
with  fat,  round  cheeks;  he  had  been  struck  in  the 
brain  by  a  fragment  of  a  shell,  and  incessantly,  hour 
after  hour,  about  every  half  minute,  he  would  lift 
his  right  arm  and  his  right  leg  simultaneously  and 
then  let  them  fall  again,  accompanying  his  move- 
ments with  a  loud  but  dull  and  hollow  "  Hah-ho ! " 
always  in  the  same  measure,  always  exactly  the 
same,  "Hah"  when  he  lifted  his  limbs,  "ho"  when 
he  let  them  fall. 

There  Niels  Lyhne  lay.  The  bullet  had  entered 
his  right  lung  and  had  not  come  out  again.  In  war 
not  much  circumlocution  can  be  used,  and  he  was 
told  he  had  but  little  chance  of  life. 

He  was  surprised;  for  he  did  not  feel  as  though 
he  were  dying,  and  his  wound  did  not  pain  him 
much.  But  soon  a  faintness  came  over  him  and 
warned  him  that  the  doctor  was  right. 


CHAPTER  XIV  281 

So  this  was  the  end.  He  thought  of  Gerda,  he 
thought  of  her  constantly  the  first  day,  but  he  was 
always  disturbed  by  the  strange,  cool  look  in  her 
eyes  the  last  time  he  had  taken  her  in  his  arms. 
How  beautiful  it  would  have  been,  how  poignantly 
beautiful,  if  she  had  clung  to  him  to  the  very  last 
and  had  sought  his  eye  till  her  own  was  glazed  in 
death;  if  she  had  been  content  to  breathe  out  her 
life  upon  the  heart  that  loved  her  so  well  instead  of 
turning  away  from  him  at  the  last  moment  to  save 
herself  over  into  more  life  and  yet  more  life ! 

On  the  second  day  in  the  hospital,  Niels  felt 
more  and  more  oppressed  by  the  heavy  atmosphere 
in  the  room,  and  his  longing  for  fresh  air  was 
strangely  intertwined  in  his  mind  with  the  desire 
to  live.  After  all,  there  had  been  so  much  in  life 
that  was  beautiful,  he  thought,  as  he  remembered 
the  fresh  breeze  along  the  shore  at  home,  the  cool 
soughing  of  the  wind  in  the  beech  forests  of  Sjael- 
land,  the  pure  mountain  air  of  Clarens,  and  the 
evening  zephyrs  of  Lake  Garda.  But  when  he  began 
to  think  of  human  beings,  his  soul  sickened  again. 
He  summoned  them  in  review  before  him,  one  by 
one,  and  they  all  passed  and  left  him  alone,  and  not 
one  stayed  with  him.  But  how  far  had  he  held  fast 
to  them?  Had  he  been  true?  He  had  only  been 
slower  in  letting  go,  that  was  all.  No,  it  was  not  that. 
It  was  the  dreary  truth  that  a  soul  is  always  alone. 
Every  belief  in  the  fusing  of  soul  with  soul  was  a 


282  NIELS  LYHNE 

lie.  Not  your  mother  who  took  you  on  her  lap,  nor 
your  friend,  nor  yet  the  wife  who  slept  on  your 
heart  .  .  . 

Toward  evening,  inflammation  set  in,  and  the 
pain  of  his  wound  increased. 

Hjerrild  came  and  sat  by  him  for  a  few  minutes 
in  the  evening,  and  at  midnight  he  returned  and 
stayed  a  long  time.  Niels  was  suffering  intensely 
and  moaned  with  pain. 

"A  word  in  all  seriousness,  Ly  hne,"said  Hjerrild. 
"  Do  you  want  to  see  a  clergyman  ? " 

"  I  have  no  more  to  do  with  clergymen  than  you 
have,"  Niels  whispered  angrily. 

"Never  mind  me!  I  am  alive  and  well.  Don't 
lie  there  and  torture  yourself  with  your  opinions. 
People  who  are  about  to  die  have  no  opinions,  and 
those  they  have  don't  matter.  Opinions  are  only  to 
live  by  —  in  life  they  can  do  some  good,  but  what 
does  it  matter  whether  you  die  with  one  opinion  or 
another?  See  here,  we  all  have  bright,  tender  mem- 
ories from  our  childhood;  I  have  seen  scores  of 
people  die,  and  it  always  comforts  them  to  bring 
back  those  memories.  Let  us  be  honest !  No  matter 
what  we  call  ourselves,  we  can  never  quite  get  that 
God  out  of  heaven ;  our  brain  has  fancied  Him  up 
there  too  often,  the  picture  has  been  rung  into  it 
and  sung  into  it  from  the  time  we  were  little  chil- 
dren." 

Niels  nodded. 


CHAPTER  XIV  283 

Hjerrild  bent  down  to  catch  his  words  if  he 
wished  to  say  anything. 

"You  are  very  good,"  Niels  whispered,  "but" 
—  and  he  shook  his  head  decisively. 

The  room  v/as  still  a  long  time  except  for  the 
peasant  lad's  everlasting  "Hah-ho!"  hammering 
the  hours  to  pieces. 

Hjerrild  rose.  "Good-by,  Lyhne,"  he  said. 
"After  all,  it  is  a  noble  death  to  die  for  our  poor 
country." 

"Yes,"  said  Niels,  "and  yet  this  is  not  the  way 
we  dreamed  of  doing  our  part  that  time  long,  long 

ago." 

Hjerrild  left  him.  When  he  came  into  his  own 
room,  he  stood  a  long  while  by  the  window  looking 
up  at  the  stars. 

"If  I  were  God,"  he  said  under  his  breath,  and 
in  his  thoughts  he  continued,"  I  would  much  rather 
save  the  man  who  was  not  converted  at  the  last 
moment." 

The  pain  in  Niels's  wound  grew  more  and  more 
intense ;  it  tore  and  clutched  at  his  breast,  it  per- 
sisted without  mercy.  What  a  relief  it  would  have 
been  if  he  had  had  a  god  to  whom  he  could  have 
moaned  and  prayed! 

Toward  morning  he  grew  delirious,  the  inflam- 
mation was  progressing  rapidly. 

So  it  went  on  for  two  more  days  and  two  more 
nights. 


284 


NIELS  LYHNE 


The  last  time  Hjerrild  saw  Niels  Lyhne  he  was 
babbling  of  his  armor  and  of  how  he  must  die 
standing. 

And  at  last  he  died  the  death  —  the  difficult 
death. 


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